Thank you for the question.
The life paths of our region’s first female doctor of medicine, Vilma Hugonnai, and the painter of Indian-Hungarian identity/origin, Amrita Sher-Gil. Through these life paths, I try to examine the constructions of modern female identity, cultural mediation and memory, identity/construction changes, and their interpretation possibilities. My reflection focuses on those female life strategies that pushed the boundaries of traditional social roles at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries and in the era of modernity. The resulting status changes, the narratives of female autonomy, and how the cultural memory of these exceptional life paths was, or could be, formed are important. What is/could this narrative be about?
- Not about “women’s history” in general, but about the conflict between female exceptionalism and social acceptance,
- Not just about career histories, but about identity shifts and self-interpretations,
- Not just about Hugonnai and Sher-Gil as individuals, but about “cultural mediators”:
Hugonnai: science – healing – female education – social reform, Sher-Gil (and her family): Europe – India – art – “transnational/transcontinental identity”.
And perhaps the most exciting “new” concept may be “female legacy formation”, i.e. how a once controversial female character could later become a national or international icon.
If I had to answer all this in one sentence, I would try to reframe the formation of modern female identity and cultural memory through the life paths of Vilma Hugonnai and Amrita Sher-Gil, with particular attention to specific boundary crossings and the possibilities of female achievements entering the historical canon. I would like to and try to follow/accompany women's life paths that were considered exceptional in their time and have now become important pillars and points of reference for the interpretation of our cultural heritage.