Above: “The Magician” by Agnes Toth

Contemporary artist Agnes Toth (born, 1981 in Gyor, Hungary) displays an inimitable style and with great story-telling ability.  Toth graduated from University College, Falmouth (U.K.) with an M.A. in Fine Art Contemporary Practice and prior to this; the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts in Budapest. She has had several international solo and group exhibitions. She also does coverf art for Hungarian neo-classical dark wave artists “The Moon and the Night Spirit”.

• The source of Toth’s inspiration is primarily from nature, and her own life, using images from personal experiences. Whilst painting in her studio, she likes to listen to a wide variety of music ranging from classics such as Debussy through to the hip hop sounds of Eminem.
• On average, each painting takes about 5-6 months to paint; and she often has 2 or 3 paintings in progress at the same time, so she can focus on one of the pieces for a week, and the following week move to the next work. It also depends on the oil paint, because it takes about 3-4 days to dry.

Above: Cover art from The Moon and the Night Spirit’s Album Regő Rejtem

• In 2013, Toth was interviewed by Hungarian Success Stories and the following is a summary of this interview. See the full interview from 27 October, 2013.
  

In September 2013, the National Portrait Gallery in London nominated her portrait “The Magician“, of British Magician Drummond Money-Coutts for the BP Portrait Award. This award is one of the most prestigious awards in portraiture in the world today. Although Toth does not consider herself a portrait artist, figures have always played a major role in her paintings. Drummond Money-Coutts is an English Magician, and Toth found his character determining. She described him during the sitting as: “The man of today, the man of our age. He is an iconic figure, ambitious, unique and metropolitan; with a strong traditional and historical English background. Drummond’s character seemed to be the perfect model to describe portraiture today”.

The conception of the tripled portrait composition was due to Toth’s observance of his presence and she found something very geometric about him, his movements, his lines, and the crispiness of his suit. It was then that she knew it was not going to be a painting like anything she had done before.  She knew it had to be very specific and very sharp and described this as: “My aim was to paint the finest possible portrait, to make it become the ultimate portrait that I can possibly achieve, and the ultimate portrait to represent portraiture today.”

• For more information about Agnes Toth, please visit her website or Facebook community page for regular updates. Artworks by Agnes Toth can also be purchased at Saatchi Online.

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