This November we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of pianist Géza Anda, on which occassion, at the initiative of the Géza Anda Foundation in Zurich the internationally acclaimed artist was commemorated on 24 September at the French Institute in Budapest (Institute Français de Budapest).
At the event, as part of the Budapest Classic Film Marathon, a film made in 1966, considered a curiosity, on the life and work of the artist was screened. Before the screening, Government Commissioner for the Development of the Hungarian Film Industry Csaba Káel welcomed the audience and commemorated Géza Anda.
Anda Géza—Pianist, Conductor, Teacher is a black-and-white Swiss documentary directed by Richard Leacock, the creator of direct cinema, or “observational cinema”, alongside Rolf Liebermann. It aims to create an experience of reality, to objectively record the event and to observe it directly.
After the screening, Dénes Várjon, the former winner of the triennial Géza Anda Piano Competition in Zurich, the only Hungarian winner so far, gave a short concert, playing Beethoven’s Sonata in E-flat major No. 1, Op. 27.
The audience of the evening was the first to see an exhibition of posters, the pieces of which recall the life and character of Géza Anda in the context of the centenary.
