Since the turn of the twentieth century all the way through to the present day, many children keep a memory book, in which they note memorable events and advice. Friends and acquaintances write evergreen poems and aphorisms into these diarylike little books, or perhaps send a message to the owner with sweet drawings or sketches. In 1922, a seven-year-old Marianne Gábor, who would later become known as a painter, also had such a memory book. Marianne’s memory book was a gift of Jenő Heltai, who began his entry on the first page thus: “Those who are loved by the gods / are forever left as children”. These lines of the Heltai poem have appeared in countless cultural contexts ever since, from Judit Halász (singer of Hungarian children’s music) to Hungarian rock-pop band Belga’s song Ovi [nursery school]; the point of departure for the exhibition entitled Marianne’s Memory Book, however, derives from its original layers of meaning.

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At the focus of the investigation of Sári Gink, Katalin Kortmann Járay and Karina Mendreczky stands one of the tokens of our human and social self-identity: our childhood memory, its forms of expression and its effects exercised upon the receiver. We are familiar with countless forms of memory; there is collective, social and historical memory, but among all of them it is personal memory that most determines our identity. Mnemonic activity can be automatic or spontaneous (implicit), and it can be conscious, intentional (explicit) inscribing, preservation and evocation. The implicit mode of evocation is primarily the nature of practised skills and episodic memory: it is here that we store our personal experiences and observations. The aim of the exhibition is for the elements arranged in the space to evoke implicit memories that relate to the childhood of the visitors. Fantasy and reality can often become confused in the mind of a child. The inextricable mixture of these frequently provides abundant fertile ground for the adult artist self to create memory-based work.

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The ensemble of objects in the PINCE (Cellar) exhibition space, comprised of many elements yet viewable as a single site-specific installation, reaches back to the childhood and schooldays of the artists, while also including details that will be familiar to the viewer. One of the central elements of the exhibition is the installation produced from several hundred school notebooks printed with the “little boat” emblem familiar to everyone (in Hungary). It is however less likely that the visitors will know that these blue (lined), red (graph), and green (blank) notebooks, known by the name Harmónia [Harmony], are the products of the Fűzfői Papírmanufaktúra [Willow Paper Factory], founded in 1928 and operating still today, which has provided writing materials to schoolchildren for generations. The artists ask that the visitors, for the period of the exhibition, step out from their passive position as viewers, and either with their names or without, write, or perhaps draw, their own memories that are recalled by the individual objects, or the totality of the exhibition.

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The other defining element of the exhibition is the vitrine cabinet-object originally from the 1950s. The varnished piece of furniture, reminiscent of our grandmothers’ living rooms, takes on a vastly different reading when it emerges in the exhibition space. The cabinet that has undergone restoration and a complete transformation, thus reborn, appears as a kind of dreamlike collection of rarities, i.e., a “Kunst- und Wunderkammer”, filled with uniquely designed objects and small sculptures of diverse materials.

The exhibition comprising a myriad of small details contains numerous elements that will be at least familiar to anyone (in Hungary), but might even revive decisive memories. The Anker building block, the wall-pattern from a handmade roller, the clay figures, or even the supplement to a publication that becomes an origami „salt-shaker”, all lead to creative childhood experiences that might carry a serious impact, or even life-changing significance in adulthood.

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The most important question posed by the exhibition entitled Marianne’s Memory Book is just what sort of direct or indirect impact our childhood experiences and memories have on our adult existence, and especially on our artistic practice. The exhibition objects on the one hand accompany the artists to their childhood world, and on the other hand, invite the visitors to also participate in this complicated process, or even become a part of it.