Miklós Menyhért (Mederl)
Born József Miklós Mederl in Kőszeg in 1878, he adopted the name Menyhért in 1904. His life has not been researched or written about, and we cannot present his full career here. The primary source for his artistic biography is a letter he wrote to Károly Lyka in 1930, summing up his career to date. There are some other sources in design archives, articles and contemporary catalogue entries. His artistic and architectural work made successful use of several styles, and among his furniture designs (some unrealised) and his shop interiors, villas, industrial buildings, blocks of flats and public institutions, we find premodern, historicist, geometric Art Nouveau, Streamline Moderne and Art Deco styles.
After secondary school in Kőszeg, he followed his father’s footsteps, starting as an assistant in his joinery workshop, but between 1897 and 1899 studied in the Timber Industry course of the Magyar Királyi Állami Felsőipar Iskola (Hungarian Royal State Industrial College). In 1901, he was a student on the design course, led by Pál Horti, of the Székesfővárosi Iparrajziskola art school. Although he and his father established the “J. Mederl and Son” furniture-making company in Kőszeg in 1902, he was by then living in Budapest, having started to work in the office of Ödön Faragó in 1901. He then went to work for Pál Horti, with whom he was involved in the installation of the Hungarian pavilion of the 1902 International Exhibition of Decorative Art at Turin. Károly Lyka wrote in his memoirs that in Turin, he met the German architect and applied artist Peter Behrens, whose work influenced his style in the years around the turn of the century. Furniture made to his own plans in the “geometric” Art Nouveau style appeared at the Applied Arts Association Christmas Exhibition in 1902, in the Spring Exhibition in 1903, and on design patterns published the same year. From then on he appeared nearly every year at Hungarian exhibitions of the Applied Arts Association. He was involved in the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, and the same year, the Applied Arts Association commissioned him to organise an applied arts exhibition in Miskolc. In 1905, he won first prize in the Association’s competition to design grandfather clocks. In 1906, he was one of the designers of the Hungarian pavilion at the Milan International Exhibition, where he also showed a dining room suite which won a gold medal within the Hungarian section. He designed the furnishings for the new Parisiana orfeum Palaise de la Dance in Két Szerecsen (now Paulay Ede) Street (1910), since destroyed. Before 1911, he was awarded a scholarship in Germany, where he learned about contemporary German applied art and architecture.
In 1911, having hitherto worked solely as an applied artist, he and Béla Rerrich submitted an entry for a competition for the Budapest Public Library building, and won first prize. Between 1912/1913 and 1916, he led an architectural practice together with János Schulek at 7 Királyi Pál Street, premises maintained by Menyhért until 1943, although Schulek does not feature among the many of the peers he mentions in his memoirs. Their joint entries won first prize in the competition for the headquarters of the General Savings Bank in Kőszeg, third prize in the competition for the Lutheran Church in Kőszeg, and fifth prize in the 1913 competition for the Budapest buildings of the Trieste General Insurance Company. In 1913, they designed the three-story workshop of the Fegyver- és gépgyár (Armaments and Machinery Works), the outline and style of which betrays the influence of German industrial architecture. The plans accepted for the Budapest Crematorium in 1916 are signed by Menyhért, Samu Sándor Löffler and Andor Szende. Some years later, Menyhért returned to industrial architecture and designed the factory and warehouses of the Hangya Szövetkezet (1920) and the Lampart enamel works, staff flats and administration building (1922). In 1926, he and Rerrich again had joint plans accepted in an architectural competition, this time for the Karcag House of Culture, which was built the following year. In 1929, the government invited him and Dénes Györgyi to design the Hungarian pavilion for the 1930 Barcelona International Exhibition. They came up with a building that displays the stylistic marks of Art Deco. It has since been demolished, but was documented in photographs published in the periodicals Tér és Forma and Magyar Iparművészet. It won the acclaim of the architectural community of the time and is still regarded as one of the foremost accomplishments of Hungarian Art Deco architecture.
We know from Károly Lyka’s memoirs that he taught in the Székesfővárosi Iparrajziskola art school between 1904 and 1911, and then in the Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola (Hungarian Royal State Industrial College) until 1914. He held several titles. He was admitted to the Hungarian Applied Arts Society as early as 1904, became vice president of the Magyar Iparművészek Testülete (Corporation of Hungarian Applied Artists) in 1911, and was its president between 1917 and 1925. He served on the board of directors of the company Budapesti Textilművészeti Műhely Rt., founded in 1913, together with Lajos Kozma, Artúr Lakatos and Román Aurélné (the wife of the founder), until it was wound up in 1931. In 1925, he became a member of the Art Council and the Chamber of Engineers, and in 1931, he was admitted to the Budapest Chamber of Engineers. His name appears on the list of members of the National Literature and Arts Council from 1934 onwards.
His life after 1930 is difficult to reconstruct. He no doubt maintained his professional standing as both an architect and applied artist, and his name appears in competitions up to 1943, but very few realised architectural plans are currently known of. In 1936, Magyar Iparművészet reported on a pavilion he designed for the Budapest International Exhibition called “Masterpieces of Craft”, and the same year, the Patents Court filed a design under his name for a gap-free roller shutter cabinet (number R6819 VIII/i). In 1937, Tér és Forma carried an article about a modern elementary school for girls in Horthy Mihály (now Bartók Béla) Road in the 11th District of Budapest, designed by Menyhért and István Sárkány. He entered a furniture suite for a study into the 1938 Berlin Handicraft Exhibition, and in 1939, in the new office of the German travel agency in the Haas Palace, which then stood on Vörösmarty Square, the modern interior design and furnishings were the work of Miklós Menyhért. The same year, the City of Budapest invited him to design an elementary school for a site on the corner of Sörgyár and Sibrik Miklós Streets. In 1941, he organised the exhibition New German Architecture in the Műcsarnok gallery and wrote about it in an article in Magyar Iparművészet. This contains some disturbing German propagandist sentiments. In the list of architects of pavilions for the 1942 Budapest International Fair, his name appears as one of the designers of the German building. In 1943, his plans were selected in the architectural competition for the OTI clinic in Csepel.
At present, the report for that 1943 architectural competition is the last source in which Miklós Menyhért can clearly be identified. His name does not appear in Budapest telephone books as an owner or resident of the property at 7 Király Pál Street after 1943. In 1958, the regional newspaper Vas Népe carried a little coloured entry about the 80th birthday celebration of an engineer called Miklós Menyhért who was an active or retired employee of the Ágyterítőgyár (Bedcover Works) in Kőszeg. Unfortunately, the name and date of birth are not enough to make an identification, and evidence for him having spent his old age in Kőszeg can only come from further archive and company-history research. No obituary for Miklós Menyhért is known of at the time of writing.
A budapesti és a környékbeli távbeszélő-hálózatok előfizetőinek és nyilvános állomásainak betűrendes névsora.1913. december (Budapest) / M. Budapest 1913, pp. 296, 391.
cf. Budapesti telefonkönyvek 1906-1950. Budapest 1914-1943.
Almási Balogh L.: ’A karácsonyi kiállítás’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1903/1, p.16.
Architectus: ’A karcagi kultúrház épületének bemutatása’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1927, pp.71, 77–78.
B. V.: ’A magyar kiállítási palota a barcelonai világkiállításon’ in: Tér és Forma 1929, pp.350–354.
Bolla Z.: A magyar art deco építészet I. Budapest 2016, pp.98, 175.
Diner-Dénes J.: ’A lakberendezési tavaszi kiállítás’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1903/3, p.112.
Ferkai A. Buda építészete a két vh. között. Művészeti emlékek. Budapest 1995, p.26.
Gerle J. – Kovács A.– Makovecz I.: A századforduló magyar építészete. Budapest 1990, p.128.
Györgyi K.: ’Az iparművészet a milánói kiállításon’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1906/4–5, pp.164–165, 209.
Iskolai értesítők: Budapest – Községi Iparrajziskola. Községi Iparrajziskola. Budapest 1901, p.53.
Iskolai értesítők: Budapest – Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola. Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola. Budapest 1897, pp.139, 209.
Iskolai értesítők: Budapest – Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola. Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola. Budapest 1898, p.127.
Iskolai értesítők: Budapest – Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola. Magyar Királyi Állami Felső Ipariskola. Budapest 1899, p.93.
K.I.: ’Beszámoló Menyhért Miklós születésnapi ünnepségéről’ in: Vas Népe 1958/291, p.5.
Magyar Pénzügyi Compass 1. 1914-1915. Budapest, 1915. p.440.
Magyarország tiszti cím- és névtára 1935, p.253.
Menyhért M.: ’Új német építészet’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1941, pp.123–130.
Payer J.: ’A 37. Budapesti Nemzetközi Vásár’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1942, p.85.
Ráth Gy. (ed.): Bútoripari mintalapok iparosok és ipariskolák számára. I–III. Budapest, 1903, I/4, 9–10, 13; II/4, 8-10; III/11–12.
cf. https://gyujtemeny.imm.hu/kereses/osszetett?s=1&gyid=22&mn=&alk=Menyh%C3%A9rt+%28Mederl%29%2C+Mikl%C3%B3s&m=&any=&t=&kit=1903&kii=&kh=&lsz= (2022.09.29.)
s.a. ’A Sibrik Miklós ut és Sörgyár utca sarkán épülő elemi iskola építési munkáinak vállalatba adása’ in: Vállalkozók Lapja 1939/26, p.11.
s.a. ’A Budapesti Mérnöki Kamara közleményei’ in: A Magyar Mérnök- és Építész-Egylet Közlönye 1930/11-12, p.108.
s.a. ’Vegyes közlemények’ in: Magyar Könyvszemle 1911/4, p.385.
s.a. ’Budapesti textilművészeti műhely részvénytársaság’ in: Központi Értesítő 1931/6, p.78.
s.a. ’Éves beszámoló’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1943, p.12.
s.a. ’Hazai krónika. Kitüntetések’ in: Művészet 1905/3, p.202.
s.a. ’Hivatalos rész’ in: Budapesti Közlöny 1934/171, p.1.
s.a. ’Hazai krónika. Kitüntetések’ in: Művészet 1907/1, p.70.
s.a. ’Kivonat a hivatalos lapból’ in: Pesti Hírlap 1904. 06. 28., p.18.
s.a. ’Magyar kézművesipar a berlini kiállításon’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1938, pp.157, 163.
s.a. ’Menyhért Miklós által tervezett „Kézműipari Remekek” pavilon bemutatása’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1936, p.85.
s.a. ’Menyhért Miklós legújabb műve, a Norddeutscher LLoyd Bremen és a Mitteleuropäisches Reisenbureau új helyisége’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1939, pp.89–91.; 98.
s.a. ’Menyhért Miklós’ in: Szentmiklóssy G. (ed.): A magyar feltámadás lexikona. Budapest 1930, p.849.
s.a. ’Kiállítások. Művészek Barcelónában’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1929/5–6, pp.118, 122–123.
s.a. ’Vegyesek. Tervpályázati eredmény’ in: A Magyar Mérnök- és Építész-Egylet Közlönye 1913/30, p.528.
s.a. ’Tervpályázati eredménye’ in: Építő Ipar 1912/40, p.397.
s.a. ’Egyleti Közlemények. Tervpályázati eredmények’ in: A Magyar Mérnök- és Építész-Egylet Közlönye 1943/13, p.104.
s.a. ’Községi nyilvános könyvtár és közművelődési intézet tervpályázat’ in: Magyar Építőművészet 1911/8, pp.1-32.
s.a. ’Új korszerű iroda a Vörösmarty téren’ in: Vállalkozók Lapja 1939/13, p.7.
s.a. ’Új találmányi bejelentések’ in: Vállalkozók Lapja 1936/11, p.13.
s.a. ’Hivatalos tudósítások. Vidéki iparművészeti kiállítások’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1904/4, p.198.
s.a. cégjegyzék in: Központi Értesítő 1902/101, p.1946.
s.a.’ Budapest székesfőváros újabb iskolaépületei’ in: Tér és Forma 1937, pp.37–40.
Schäfer, F. ’A barcelonai világkiállítás magyar pavilonja’ in: Magyar Iparművészet 1929/5–6, 95-96.
Sources in achives (Budapest):
Letter to Károly Lyka with autobiography of Miklós Menyhért (1930), Archive of the HAS RCH Institute of Art History (Hungarian Academy of Sciences) - MKCS-C-I-17/1257.1-2.
The Theater in the Paulay Ede street, description by Endre János Morvay, Archive of the HAS RCH Institute of Art History (Hungarian Academy of Sciences) - MKCS-1-143. 4.
Authorisation to use (no. 20677/1916-III) of the new buildings (parcel no. 9640/1/c) of the company 'Fegyver-és Gépgyár Rt.' (1916), Budapest City Archives - BFL, XV.17.d.329, 276. (20677/1916-III).
Maps, descriptions ...etc. of the constructions of the company 'Magyar Fém- és Lámpaárugyár Rt.', Budapest City Archives - BFL, XV.17.f.834/228-230. boxes
by Sarolta Sztankovics
