The native land consecrated by the Csángós [a Hungarian-speaking Roman Catholic ethnographic group primarily living in Moldavia, Romania] through their labour, sweat, and art is itself a miracle. How could it be otherwise, when from the heavens Babba Mary (Babba Mária) – the Virgin Mary – looks down from the skies upon her own people. She watches over them so that, despite immeasurable suffering, for many decades the curse of ‘Romanianisation’ has lain upon them – they might remain Hungarian. That they might preserve their language, the archaic inheritance that enfolds Hungarian antiquity like a jewel, and, with their schools and churches returned to them (only in part!), raise the generation which, even in the darkness cast upon it by politics, no longer needs to walk in fear.

It was this Csángó land that sent forth one of its sons most ready for service: Mária Petrás. What she carried in her knapsack is beautifully signalled by the cosmic art of her relative, Miklós Gyurkáné Rózsa Szályka – Zoltán Kallós gathered the full material for Új guzsalyam mellett (By My New Distaff) from this genial informant decades ago. For this illiterate woman – a miracle in a land of miracles – bore the universe in her head. Her ballads are mirrors of fate: by gazing into them, not only the Csángós could recognise themselves, thereby strengthening their sense of justice, but every region of the universal Hungarian community as well.

Our artist, who became a master of both ceramics and singing, drew her sustenance from this soil. The landscape, the stubborn earth that only yields to hard labour, and the work that kept families alive – hemp was broken and scutched, linen woven, honey spun, cart parts and other implements carved – all of it seeped into her blood. So, too, did the spiritual goods we class as folk art (tale, poetry, song, music, and dance) and the many branches of craft (weaving, spinning, and ceramics).

Whoever began the day with prayer and ended it with prayer clearly understands that they were only a speck of dust in the universe. The life-giving force resides in the Lord who stretches the canopy of heaven above us. And in the Child Jesus, born again and again – this has been celebrated for centuries by the pilgrims of the Csíksomlyó (Șumuleu Ciuc) pilgrimage and by pilgrims arriving from distant continents – and, not least, in the Virgin Mary of Csíksomlyó already mentioned: Babba Mary, raised to omnipotence, who watches over the affairs of the peace-hungry human being and of the world (including Pusztina, Tatros, Diószén, Klézse [Pustiana, Târgu Trotuș, Gioseni, Cleja]).

The artist’s own testimony also affirms the importance of the ‘home front’ as a protective force, as an unassailable bastion: “Back then, people were so devout; they really knew how to be in relationship with God. If they wanted something, they would pray until they received it; or, if not, they would receive some kind of answer that made it so: that this was how it was, and so it should be. I find it so wonderful, and I consider these the most valuable things in my life. There was something superhuman they clung to, and that superhuman element was within them.”

All of this was upheld by prayer.

If we feel, even slightly, the power of the Csíksomlyói naphimnusz (Sun Hymn of Csíksomlyó) by István Ferenczes, then we also sense the aura of the consecrated land proclaimed by Pál Péter Domokos, often called “the apostle of the Csángó conscience”. An aura that is, at the same time, an arcanum prompting life itself – an awakening towards a better life: “Mindenható Isten, fölséges Atyánk, / Téged dicsér minden és téged áld. / Szívünkből száll minden ének, / Könyörgés, hála, dicséret / Hozzád kiált. (– –) // Madonna-kékben tengerárnyi hópihét, / Adtál nekünk sok Húgocskát, csillag-csibét, / Tejutat, göncölt, ragyogást, / Mint szelíd őznek álmodást / S békés ébredést. // Téged áld Uram a Víz, a mi szép Nénénk, / Tóból, tiszta forrásból tükröt tart elénk. / Végestől a végtelenig, / Ő visz a kéklő tengerig / Kegyelmedért.” (lit. “Almighty God, our exalted Father, / All praises You and blesses You. / From our hearts rises every song, / Supplication, thanks, and praise / Crying to You. (– –) // In Madonna-blue, a sea of snowflakes, / You gave us many little Sisters, star-chicks, / The Milky Way, the Plough, radiance, / Like gentle-doe dreaming / And peaceful waking. // The Water blesses You, Lord, our fair Aunt, / From lake and pure spring it holds a mirror before us. / From the finite to the infinite, / It carries us to the blueing sea / For Your grace.”)

Already in childhood, skilled in drawing and singing just as well (the Mass provided practice), Mária Petrás was well aware of the treasure she had inherited. Diószén, her native village, naturally provided only the foundations – foundations that were extraordinarily strong and unshakeable. Yet talent is talent precisely because it is not satisfied with what it is given: it augments it through study. After primary school, the first step was the Vocational School of Hétfalu [the ‘Hétfalu’ region near Brassó (Brașov), historically associated with Hungarian communities] (where she trained in electrical instrumentation), followed by the Brașov Community School of Music and Fine Arts (Zenei és Képzőművészeti Népfőiskola). After three years of diligent work, she completed the graphics specialisation with distinction.

But the decisive leap was provided by the Hungarian University of Applied Arts in Budapest and its postgraduate master’s programme (1991–1995 and 1995–1997). The young woman who came for the birthday of Pál Péter Domokos – with two children – began her ‘conquest’ of a new homeland. And this was the true trial of entering artistic life. Although she did not wish to abandon her excellent draughtsmanship – one still feels, in her ceramics, the force of an inventive line – she was increasingly captivated by plastic form. A new world, emerging in three dimensions. Thought – mainly carrying sacred content – concealed within sculpture: ceramic sculpture, relief.

Mária Petrás wrote her thesis on the Csángós – its title: Panaszolkodás Istennek (Complaining to God). Her diploma project was a cross intended for her native village. Since the village – unbelievably – refused to accept the gift, the sculptural group ultimately found a worthy home in the Franciscan Monastery of Deva (Krisztus a kereszten [Christ on the Cross], 1997). What prompted the artist to this plastic confession? “At the time I thought a great deal about our fate,” she said in an interview I conducted (A boldogság dimenziói [Dimensions of Happiness], 2009), “and I felt we have a share in Christ’s fate. As Christ came to the cross, we too shall come to the cross. Indeed, we are already on it. We are crucified.”

A staggering confession of a personally lived drama of fate that has persecuted the Csángós for centuries. Yet within this collection – this grief raised into fired clay – there are not only examples such as the various striking corpus-variations (Virágzó kereszt [Flowering Cross], 2001; Pieta [Pietà], 1999; Pietà, 2008; 2009; Felhős feszület [Clouded Crucifix], 2009; Tulipános feszület [Crucifix with Tulips], 2009; Üvegkorpusz [Glass Corpus], 1999); not to mention the elemental Keresztút [Stations of the Cross] in Százhalombatta (2000) and Szár (2001) – but also works in which suffering becomes a source of joy. This relief brings light and illumination. In these works, too, the artist often turns to Scripture – for there is no more universal symbol than the multitude of biblical events – and no less to Hungarian mythology (her ‘Tree of Life’ variations also carry a kind of holiness).

At the centre of her unglazed ceramic reliefs, which contain only a hint of colour, stands the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, holding her child in her lap. The position of the body – or bodies – lends a peculiar flavour to the compositions. From the Mother nursing her little one (Mária kisdeddel [Mary with Infant], 2004; Babba Mária [Babba Mary] – 2002; 2004; 2006; Szoptatós Madonna [Nursing Madonna], 2002) to the radiant Child Jesus held in the lap (Napba öltözött Mária [Mary Clothed in the Sun], 1999; Mária Kisjézussal [Mary with the Child Jesus], 1999; 2006; Babba Mary, 2000; 2003; 2004; 2006; Világfás Babba Mária [Babba Mary with the World Tree], 2006; Holdas Mária [Moon Mary], 2008; Koronás Mária [Crowned Mary], 2009; Katrincás Madonna [Madonna in Katrinca (a Csángó garment)], 2004), and onward to the Mother–Child pair surrounded by various holy figures (Mária angyalkórussal [Mary with an Angelic Choir], 1999; Mária angyalokkal [Mary with Angels], 2008; Világ királynője [Queen of the World], 1999), the series of variations unfolds. Not only does the background change, or the structurally emphasised position of some object (throne, crown, robe and its folds), but also the tilt of mother and child’s heads, their smiles, their wondering or serene gazes, and the form of their gestures.

To be sure, surface dynamism – thanks to inventive modelling – lives here too. However, it is even more evident in those reliefs where the imitation of movement becomes a force intrinsic to the grouped formations (Queen of the World; Mary with Angels; Mária asszonyokkal [Mary with Women], 2008, etc.). In these latter ceramics, it is worth observing how the faces – those dreamy, inward-looking gazes – display a kind of transfiguration that almost becomes a character trait. And this inward smile can be discerned even on the face of a queen (see Crowned Mary). Indeed, it has degrees, though the depiction of this familiar motif-world is extraordinarily powerful in its transfigured quality (Szent Erzsébet [Saint Elizabeth], 2009).

If, within Christian symbolism, as the Jelképtár [a Hungarian compendium/dictionary of symbols] describes, the lily is “the symbol of heavenly love, virginal purity and innocence, and an attribute of pure-souled, virginal saints, among them Saint Anne, Saint Emeric, but above all the Virgin Mary”, then the plastic formation (head, mantle, and other ‘telling’ elements) clearly demonstrates with what astonishing precision the artist renders the heavenly and the earthly. It will suffice here to recall the spiritual smile of the two versions of Szent Erzsébet [Saint Elizabeth], both 2008), the holy woman holding bread and a bouquet of roses in her lap; the various Virgin (Babba) Mary variations; and, not least, the greeting gesture of the kneeling man with an equally transfigured face (Szent Imre [Saint Emeric]).

Transforming biblical stories into a plastic form is, beyond the faith that shines through them, one of the miracles of artistic achievement. In Angyali üdvözlet (Annunciation, 2007) – a two-figure ceramic – the prayer-pose (the kneeling figure) holds the inspired future of the soul; in the circularly enclosed Szent család (Holy Family, 2007) there is the secure love that raises the Lord of the World (the Child Jesus almost flies); and in Betlehemes (Nativity Scene, 2006) – with the emphatic presence of the Three Kings – there is protective trust, as the pledge of the years after birth.

Jesus entered Jerusalem on the Sunday before the crucifixion – that is, before Easter. His triumph is signalled by the palm branches in the hands of those who greet him. There is as yet no hint of tragedy. This is the moment captured by Petrás’s Virágvasárnap (Palm Sunday, 2004). At the centre of the relief, in half-profile, is the Man seated on the holy animal, the donkey. The Lord of the World? Much rather, a sculpture of calm. The gazes accompanying him – praising his triumph – almost lift Jesus’s figure. Yet the surface of the ceramic relief undulates in such a way – plastic invention mediating the drama to come – as if the calm were only relative.

In these ceramic works, the folds of the robe or mantle are likewise of symbolic value: at one moment they envision sunrays (Babba Mary, 2004; Babba Mary with the World Tree), at another they intimate a state close to suffering (see Station IX of the Stations of the Cross in Százhalombatta). At times, with a scale-like form, they harmonise with a bodily element of the figure, the wing (Angyali üdvözlet [Annunciation], 2002). The coloured motifs characterising the border or adorning the background – tulips, circles, hearts, sun-discs, wolf-tooth patterns, and so on – do not merely serve as ornaments: they also prepare the mood for the event depicted on the relief.

One of the most beautiful – and most astonishing – examples is the Mother’s dramatic struggle as she holds her Son, taken down from the cross, in her lap (Pietà, 1997). Their pair is the apotheosis of suffering. All this is framed by a wolf-tooth vault which – paradoxically – appears not only as a chain of knife-points, but also as a ‘reconciling’ ring of tiny, stylised Gothic cathedrals. Here, Mary, as her dress shows, is depicted as a peasant woman, a peasant Madonna. Through this profane transfiguration, the measure of unbearable pain arguably increases—a pain further intensified by the weight of the exhausted body. The raising of grief into the ‘festal’ is served by the ornate, multi-layered frame, as may be seen in the large-scale (290 × 180 cm) Pietà (2008) at the Department of Internal Medicine.

Mária Petrás’s evolving ceramic art – as the lover of clay becomes increasingly engaged in experimenting with glass as a malleable material – offers a fine example of deliberate construction. In her work, spirit and matter go hand in hand.

Yet there are few examples of anyone creating notable work in two artistic fields. As a talented folk singer, she travelled nearly the entire world with the Muzsikás Ensemble, showcasing in the most extraordinary ‘palaces’ of music the world-conquering strength of the Hungarian folk song, especially, of Csángó song culture.

[2014]