It was on 8 November 2003 that patron and art collector Gábor Kovács announced the establishment of a private foundation with the initial capital of 3 billion forints, for the purpose of supporting contemporary visual arts. Gábor Kovács set three goals for the newly established foundation: to popularize Hungarian art, in particular contemporary art, both in Hungary and abroad; to support the youngest generation of artists with exhibitions, scholarships and purchases; and to create a collection for the Foundation that would offer a historically valid overview of Hungarian art in the past 50 years.

Much of the programme has become a reality. The Kovács Gábor Art Foundation is considered among the most important institutions of Hungary, its collection includes more than 2500 works by more than 350 artists. With the FRESH exhibitions and the KOGART Prize, the Foundation was the first to offer the youngest generation of artists an opportunity to meet a wide audience. During the past years KOGART presented more than one hundred and twenty exhibitions in Hungary and two dozen abroad, making an important contribution to the vibrancy of the cultural scene. Since 2006, KOGART dedicated one or two exhibitions annually to the great masters and periods of classic art, creating very successful shows. The Foundation has cooperated with the most important Hungarian public collections and prestigious foreign museums (Three Gorges Museum, Chongqing, Zhejiang Art Museum, Hangzhou, Liu Haisu Art Museum, Shanghai, National Museum, Krakow, National Museum of Bulgarian Fine Arts, Sofia Musée d’Art Moderne de St. Etienne, Denver Art Museum, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, Cleveland, National Museum of Kazakhstan, Astana, A. Kasteyev State Museum of Art, Almaty etc.). In 2013 KOGART Tihany was opened as the first branch of the Foundation in the country.

In May 2015, a new chapter started in the Foundation's life when, under the agreement with the Ministry of Human Resources, between 13 March 2015 and 2018, the Hungarian Government has been undertaking the realisation of  13 representative exhibits in Budapest, Hungary and abroad.

The Kovács Gábor Art Foundation started the summer with a new exhibition that offers an insight into the KOGART Contemporary Art Collection by presenting seminal works of contemporary Hungarian art in the Palace of Guards at the Várkert Bazár, the display has a dual concept. With the help of the Collection, the exhibition focuses on man—the individual and their surroundings—, as well as on the historical perspective that informs the development of the Collection.

The exhibition is open until the 26th August, tickets at 2000 HUF.

Text: Várkert Bazár Press, photo: Kogart Contemporary collection