There are artists considered peripheral simply because art history has placed them elsewhere. Károly Ferenczy is one of them. In Hungary, he is a given. In France, almost a secret. The Petit Palais is finally lifting the veil. Born in 1862, died in 1917, Ferenczy belongs to that fin-de-siècle generation that crossed borders with the same ease as styles. Trained in Italy, having passed through Paris and the Académie Julian, influenced by Munich, he absorbed everything—naturalism, symbolism, impressionism—without ever dissolving into it. At the center, always, is light. A dense, almost tangible sun that structures the canvas.

In his landscapes painted en plein air in the heart of Hungarian nature, clarity becomes a spiritual principle. Ferenczy co-founded an artists' colony in Nagybánya that made nature a modern laboratory. There, they painted together, they thought together. Then came the faces. Those of his wife, his children, his father. Portraits without emphasis, imbued with a silent attentiveness. In Munich, the forest thickens, the figures take on a new gravity. Birdsong, Orpheus: biblical themes slip into contemporary landscapes, the sacred mingles with the everyday. After 1900, everything becomes clearer. Rivers, bathing, thatched cottages: painting gains in scope, in breathing. Color asserts itself. Composition is liberated. And in a corner of the studio, almost in reverse shot, subtle, ironic caricatures emerge—proof that a great modernist can also smile.

Nearly 140 works trace this remarkably coherent journey. This first French retrospective redraws the map of European modernism. A Hungarian sun rises over Paris.

PETIT PALAIS
From April 14 to September 6, 2026
Avenue Winston Churchill, 75008 
Metro Champs-Élysées - Clemenceau (1/13)
Tue. to Sun. 10am-6pm, Fri. and Sat. until late. 8 p.m.
Closed on Mon.
Price: €17 - Reduced price: €15 - Free for under 18s