Miklós Barabás

Miklós Barabás was the leading Hungarian portrait painter of the nineteenth century. His portraits of aristocrats, writers and musicians are clear and realistic, and he also painted genre scenes, landscapes and scenes of Hungarian life, helping to create a national school of painting.

Born in Márkosfalva in Transylvania, he studied in Vienna and learned lithography in Kolozsvár, then worked in Bucharest and studied watercolour in Italy. He settled in Pest, where he painted Franz Liszt in 1847 and Emperor Franz Joseph in 1853. He recorded the laying of the foundation stone of the Chain Bridge in Budapest and was president of the Hungarian art society for decades.

His Romanian Family Going to the Fair of 1844 shows his interest in rural life. Look at the careful likenesses in his portraits and the calm, even light.