Kentaur

Biography

He studied painting at the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts at the Faculty of Painting and had master class at the Faculty of Mural painting. Since the end of the 80’s his paintings regularly appear on exhibitions. As a multimedia artist, Kentaur had interest on different fields of art from his early ages. As a he was born in a family, which ancestor was the famous composer, Ferenc Erkel, who established the national opera in Hungary, he has studied classical music for 9 years. Parallel to his fine art studies, he became the solo singer and song writer of a new wave music group and later - as a solo singer – he recorded several rock albums in 1989 (New World), 1996 (Someone from the Lost City) and 2005 (Urban Stigma). In his concerts he created a stage production, in which theatre, choreography, multimedia and creative art had parallel role with music. His concerts and video clips were designed and directed by himself. He started his theatre career as a graphic designer, later becoming a set and costume designer. Since 1990 he worked for all major Hungarian theatres (Macbeth, Hamlet, As you like it etc.) as well as for musical (Les Miserables, Producers, Joseph, West Side Story, Peter Pan, Footloose, Chicago, Cabaret, Jekyll and Hyde etc.), opera (Faust, Turandot, Aida, Rigoletto etc.) and ballet (Snow White – Budapest, Tallinn, Coppelia – Wiener Staatsoper, Nutcracker – Budapest etc.) productions all over Europe and overseas, as well as for television and movie productions. He was the first stage designer in Hungary, who used interactive, live video techniques on stage. His international theatre designer career has begun in 1995 when the famous British producer, Cameron Mackintosh engaged him to redesign his world success musical productions: Miss Saigon, Phantom of the Opera, Oliver! and Martin Guerre. He debuted on the London West End with Rent in 2002 in Prince of Wales Theatre. He is the permanent set designer of the Hungarian non-replica productions of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musicals. He was the first set designer on the world, who was appointed to redesign Phantom of the Opera (2003) and The Beautiful Game (2005) for their Budapest productions. As the set and costume designer of Roman Polanskis’s Tanz der Vampire in Budapest (PS Production 2006) and in Vienna, Ronacher Theater (2009), he created a new, picturesque visual design for that cult musical. His stage visions were acknowledged by several theatre awards. In 2007 he was granted a Jászai Price from the Hungarian State for his oeuvre in theatre art.