Distorted Session #10: Focus on Hungary

The tenth instalment of the Distorted Image exhibition's accompanying programme focuses on Hungary. Hungarian media artist and filmmaker Péter Forgács will personally present his experimental film Arizona Diary from 1992 (53 min.), which captures a journey through Arizona with Hungarian poet György Petri – whose verses are part of the film – and neo-avant-garde artist György Galántai, founder of the Artpool research centre in Budapest. The film also briefly features Steina and Woody Vasulka. The work explores the genre of film diary and tests its boundaries. A discussion with the filmmaker will follow the screening.

Péter Forgács (*1950) is an author of film essays and installations, including the acclaimed cycle Private Hungary, which processes collections of found-footage amateur films from the 1930s to 1970s. He was part of the Béla Balász film studio in Budapest and one of the editors of the Infermental video magazine. In 1983 in Budapest, he founded the Private Photo & Film Archives Foundation (PPFA), a collection of amateur film recordings.

Between 2000 and 2002, he created the interactive multimedia installation The Danube Exodus: Rippling Currents of the River, based on his film of the same name from 1998. The work processes amateur recordings by ship captain Nándor Andrásovits, capturing refugee journeys along the Danube in 1939–1940. The installation was first exhibited at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, then toured several European countries and was also released as a CD-ROM.

The event takes place on Wednesday, 22 July 2026 from 17:00 at the House of Arts on Malinov Square in Brno. Tickets can be purchased in advance on GoOut or at the House of Arts box office.