Americo Makk (born Imre Makk; August 24, 1927 – May 5, 2015) was a Hungarian-born painter known for his work in portraiture and ecclesiastical art. After early artistic training in Hungary and Italy, he lived and worked in Brazil. In 1962, Makk emigrated to the United States. His subjects included political figures such as U.S. presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, as well as religious murals and paintings commissioned by churches and government institutions.
Early life and education Imre Makk was born in 1927 in Győrszentmárton, Hungary (now known as Pannonhalma), to Katalin (née Samoday) and Pál Makk, who worked as a financial supervisor for the Benedictine monks at Pannonhalma Archabbey. Makk developed an early interest in art, beginning to sketch at the age of six, and was encouraged by the Benedictine brothers to nurture his artistic talent.
Although his parents advised him to pursue a more stable career in architectural engineering,Henderson, Shelby (1986). "Makk Family: A Vision of Life", Makk Studios, Honolulu, HI. he chose instead to study painting at the Hungarian National Academy of Fine Arts in Budapest from 1945 to 1948.Ledoux, Larry (1982). "Makk, Americo, Eva, A.B.", Herff Jones Publishers, Logan Utah. At the age of 21, he was awarded a scholarship to study at the Academy of Fine Art in Rome, where he specialized in ecclesiastical art and studied the works of Renaissance masters, including Raphael, Michelangelo, and Leonardo da Vinci.Belden, Dorothy, "Beautiful Art for a Troubled World", "Hungarian Couple, Son Paint in Romantic Style", Lively Arts, The Wichita Eagle, KS, Sunday, November 4, 1979.
Makk eventually taught at the Rome Academy of Fine Art and received the Vatican Portrait Award for his painting of Cardinal József Mindszenty, a leading opponent of communism in Hungary. The portrait was permanently installed in the Vatican.
Career Brazil and life as the Makks (1949–1962)
In 1949, Americo Makk moved to São Paulo, Brazil. His wife's father, Dr. Bertalan Holusa, a former economic and agricultural adviser to Ethiopia's Haile Selassie, had fled from Africa with his family to France in 1937 as a result of the Second Italo-Ethiopian War and then to São Paulo with its rapid industrialization.Mary Burke Rossi, "The Road Leads to Freedom", Second in a Series, Herald Courier, Hyde Park, NY, Friday, April 28, 1967. "Imre" in Portuguese is "Americo", and it was here that Americo adopted the Portuguese translation for his name. Americo and Eva married in São Paulo on October 18, 1950. In 1951, they were appointed professors of Fine Arts at the Academia de Belas Artes. That same year, their son, Americo Bartholomew, A.B. Makk, was born. While in Brazil, Americo and Eva Makk jointly painted fourteen Catholic cathedrals, churches, and basilicas.Love, Frances, Art Center Director, "Makk Family to Discuss International Art", The Daily Advertiser, Lafayette, LA, Friday, February 13, 1981. Their most famous cathedral painting, "Coronation of Our Lady", was a 2,349 square foot (218 square meters) al-secco ceiling in the Cathedral of Manaus. This painting, which depicts the coronation of the Virgin Mary in her crowning as the Queen of Heaven,LeDoux, "Makk Painting: The Romance of Yesterday, The Delights of Today", Art Gallery, A Magazine of Fine Art and Photography, January 1983/1984. is the largest single motif painting in the world. The mural reportedly took two years to complete, and involved working 60 to 100 feet in the air on wood scaffolding in "stifling heat and little light."Tsutsumi, Cheryl Chee, "The Makk Family", Aloha, The Magazine of Hawaii, 1982. Americo Makk reported rats getting into the paints and he suffered a fall from the scaffolding while painting.Whitaker, William, Entertainment Editor, "Artist Battled Rats in Cathedral", Abilene Reporter-News, Abilene, TX, Sunday, November 16, 1980, From 1958 to 1962, the Makks served as Official Artists of the Brazilian government. During this period, they painted portraits of government and church officials, including Sobral Bishop Dom José Tupinambá da Frota, and collaborated on cathedral murals. Their work combined Americo and Eva’s individual styles, producing murals that appeared to be created by a single artist.Ampersand, "Treasures Shared, Art Brings together a Famous Family and Honolulu Couple", Alexander & Baldwin, Inc., Spring 1985. From then on, Americo and Eva became synonymous with each other's work, and the Makk family brand, "Casal Makk" (Portuguese for "Makk couple"), was created.Adams, Anthony, "Feast of Art At the Fair", Long Island Press, NY, Sunday, April 26, 1964. The remaining cathedral wall and ceiling paintings by the Makks, which are signed Casal Makk, are tourist attractions in Brazil to this day. Notable among these are those found in the Parish of Our Lady of Patronage (Nossa Senhora do Patrocinio) in Jau, State of São Paulo, Brazil.
Amazon expedition (1957–1959)
In 1957, their cathedral work culminated with a request via telegram from the Governor of Amazonas, Plínio Ramos Coelho, for an assignment to travel the Amazon jungle. The jungle is also known as the Amazon rainforest or Amazonia. There, they were to study the remaining Indigenous Indian tribes which were thinning by a boom of industrial growth and deforestation.Mertens, Susan, "Adapt and flourish", The Vancouver Sun, B.C., Friday, December 5, 1980.Rossi, Mary Burke, Women's Editor, "The Makk Story, Mural Tourist Attraction", Fourth in a Series, Herald Courier, New Hyde Park, NY, Friday, May 12, 1967. Both Governor Coehlo and the Mayor of Manaus, Gilberto Mestrinho (later to succeed Coelho as Governor), co-sponsored the expedition, which was planned to last approximately one to two years. Paintings were the medium of choice for the project, as it was known that some tribes hidden in the darkness of the jungle became anxious or reacted violently to camera flashes or flashbulbs.LeDoux, Larry, "Art that's all in the family", Kauai Beach Press, August 14–20, 1987. For the year preceding the trip, Americo and Eva Makk explored areas of the rainforest to get acquainted with the subject matter.
In 1958, the Makks, including 8-year-old A.B. with pet ocelot "Cica" (Hungarian for "cat"), accompanied by guides and a Catholic missionary priest, embarked on their expedition to study the flora, fauna, and inhabitants of the Amazon rainforest.Whitaker, Bill, Entertainments Editor, "Bogeyman were real growing up in Brazil", Abilene Reporter-News, TX, Thursday, November 13, 1980. They planned to meet guides at designated checkpoints, who were considered friendly Indians of various tribes. The expedition began in Manaus, the capital of Amazonas, and the heart of the Amazon jungle.Dietz, Betty, "Da Vinci Never Had Such Help", Dayton Daily News, OH, Tuesday, December 3, 1963. The trip spanned over 1,000 miles of travel by foot, riverboat, canoe, small plane, and helicopter. Travel was difficult as there were no roads, and frequent rains led to floods that washed away landmarks.Mary Burke Rossi, "Mural Tourist Attraction", The Makk Story, Fourth in a Series, Herald Courier, Hyde Park, NY, Friday, May 12, 1967. With high humidity and rain, the Makks described suffering frequent bites from small black insects called "piums".
Through the expedition, the Makks gathered and recorded images of varying indigenous people of Brazil, which included the Macus, Bare, Tucano, and Boca Negra (Tenharim).Rossi, Mary Burke, Women's Editor, "Mission to the Amazin' Amazon", Fifth in a series, Herald Courier, Hyde Park, NY, Friday, May 19, 1967. Some tribes they met along the way believed that to have their image painted would result in their souls being stolen. Thus, simple sketches were made in those regions.Rossi, Mary Burke, "The Amazon Jungle... A Green Inferno", Part VI, Herald Courier, New Hyde Park, NY, Friday, May 26, 1967. The Makks' memories of the trip were recorded in an estimated 70 paintings. In a 1982 interview for Aloha Magazine, Eva Makk said of her experience in the Amazon jungle, "Sometimes it was so dark and dense that we had to use flashlights at high noon in order to see... I think of it as a forbidden cathedral of God."
Upon their return, the Makks painted four large murals in the Palace of the Governor in Manaus, Palacio Rio Negro. One of the four paintings was of Brazilian Chief Ajuricaba leading his warriors during the expansion of Portuguese colonization of the Americas. This painting shows them with bow and arrow, going into battle against invading Portuguese forces that were armed with forged weaponry and armor. Paintings marked "Amazonas" denoted the origin and time frame of the painting, in lieu of a title. A small portion of their Amazon paintings was exhibited at the Brazilian consulate in Miami, Florida, in May 1969.Pottorff, Claire, "Internationalists Display Here", The Miami Beach Sun, FL, Vol 40, No. 156, Friday, May 2, 1969.Miami Herald, "Art Work Displayed", No. 153, Miami, FL, Friday May 2, 1969.
In an interview from 1981, when asked whether he would have attempted the trip a second time, Americo responded, "It would be too dangerous to try now. It was too dangerous then. But we [he and Eva] had an artistic feeling and desire to meet challenges, to know and to paint what no one had ever painted before. So, we accepted the invitation of the government. We were both ‘official artists of Brazil.’ But when it was over, we decided we would never do anything like that again. Because you only have one life."Kerns, William, "Acclaimed Artists Exhibit Works", Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, Lubbock, TX, May 13, 1981
Move to New York City (1962–1967)
By 1960, the communist movement controlled television, radio, and the press in São Paulo. Foodstuffs and gasoline were luxuries. As a result of the increasing political unrest in Brazil, the Makks worked on immigrating to the United States, to once again escape communism, which took two years to accomplish. As they continued work on church paintings, the Makks often wondered whether the communists would soon destroy them.Rossi, Mary Burke, Women's Editor, "America- Paradise for the Makks", The World of Art Part VIII, The Herald Courier, Hyde Park, NY, Friday June 9, 1967. In 1962, the Makks secured a sponsorship from the Ecclesiastical Art Studio of New York in New York City and moved to Long Island, New York.Jokiel, Lucy, "Family Affair: In Hawaii, The Family that Paints Together, Profits Together", Hawaii Business, Vol 32, No 10, April 1987.Denko, Gloria, "Art is for the Sensitive...", Sunday News-Globe, Amarillo, TX, Sunday, June 7, 1970. They left behind most of their belongings in Brazil to allow room for the Amazon paintings and sketches, taking with them four suitcases and a small amount of cash. On May 10, 1962, knowing very little English, the Makks arrived at Idlewild Airport, in Queens, NY.