Attila Csáji

painter, light artist, holographer

Born in Szepsi, formerly Hungary, now Slovakia. In 1948, his family was resettled in Hungary. As a child, he spent a year in Utrecht-Driebergen, Holland, where he started to study drawing.

In the 1960s and 1970s he was the chief organiser of the activities of Hungarian avant-garde art, including the monumentuous "Szürenon" exhibition, exhibition "R", series of exhibitions in Poland of underground Hungarian avant-garde art, the Balatonboglár "Chapel Exhibitions", etc. B.W.A. Scholarship (Association of Polish Artists), 1970, 1971; Károlyi Scholarship, Vence, France, 1975. From 1967 onwards his work focused on light-interpreted paintings, which included the series "Messages" and "Sign-Matrices". These were supplemented, from 1970 onwards, by the series of paintings called "Blacks".

In the middle of the 1970s he started to explore the visual and pictorial potentials of coherent laser light with physicist Dr. Norbert Kroó (Central Research Institute for Physics, Budapest), patent in 1980. Exhibitions in the Hungarian National Gallery included "Plastic Pictures" (1977), "New Experiences of Vision and Space" (1980) and "Holograms" (1983). In 1983, he made a laser animation film in the Pannonia Film Studio, Budapest, which was shown in various cities and countries including the Osnabrück Film Festival and M.I.T., Cambridge, MA. From the beginning of 1980s he had a series of laser and hologram presentations in the Bella Center, Copenhagen; Messepalast, Stuttgart; Messepalast, Vienna; Finlandia Palace, Helsinki; Hungarian Embassy, Moscow; Union College, Schenectady, New York; CAVS, Cambridge, MA. Contributions to ELECTRA'83, Museum of Modern Art, Paris; Licht Blicke ("Holography as New Medium"), German Film Museum, Frankfurt am Main. Soros grant, 1987-88. From 1987 fellow of the Center for Advanced Visual Studies, M.I.T. 1988-98: Budapest Palace of Art (individual retrospective exhibition). From 1993 member of  the  Leonardo Association (USA). 1992: grant of the Interscience Technology, Los Angeles, St.Louis, Orlando, etc.

In the early 1990s he takes an active part in the reorganisation of the institutional framework of art in Hungary. President of the Hungarian Association of Creative Artists. He reorganises the Szinyei Society (1992-93, president). President of the Art Board of The National Cultural Foundation. He organises a series of biennial Light Symposiums (held at the Kepes Museum, Eger) that draws participants internationally. Launches the International Kepes Society, its president from 2000. Member of the Baltic-area Dimension Group.