BALÁZS TURAY is a Budapest based photographer with a deep interest in societal issues. He created long-term documentary essays and he regularly photographed demonstrations and examined social and environmental changes in Hungary. Balázs Turay is interested in dealing with situations in which communities and individuals are exposed to complex social, legal and existential challenges.
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Architecture, the relationship between an individual and her / his built environment, the changes of the urban landscape have been recurring themes in his photography ever since he started making pictures.
Balázs Turay studied photography at the School of the International Center of Photography in New York (2009) and graduated (MA) at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest in 2002.
For five years, Balázs documented court hearings about the racially motivated murders of Romani people in Hungary (2008-09). He also documented the aftermath of the attacks by interviewing and photographing the survivors. He has since been vocalized the need for a rehabilitation program including PTSD treatment for the survivor.
Balázs also examined and documented the situation of refugees in Hungary. He was part of a team that created a web-based publication for interviews with Hungarian volunteers documenting their experience and motivation. Balázs Turay’s main focus is to examine racial, social, financial inequality, through photography. He seeks to shape the discourse about photography and aims to tackle visual stereotypes when depicting vulnerable groups and articulating societal issues. Balazs Turay lives and works in Budapest.
Projects, books, collaborations and assignments:
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Sziget - again
After the enormously challenging years of the Covid 19 pandemic Sziget was here again with excellent artists, redesigned and clean restrooms. Neither baking hot, nor torrential rain hit the Island of Freedom, or Island of Love as many people call the festival. In a country where things seem fairly dystopian everything looked just normal. At least for a few days...
A collaboration with Florence La Bruyére (2023)
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Take Me Dancing
The aftermath of forced eviction of Romani-people in Hungary (2014 - 2018).
The project was supported by former MEP Benedek Jávor and The Greens / EFA and was first exhibited in the Parliament of the European Union in Brussels as part of ROMAWEEK in April 2018.
A photo album entitled Take Me Dancing was published on the occasion of the opening of the exhibition of this body of work in Budapest at the end of 2018.
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Volunteers On The Rise
Interviews with Hungarian volunteers who worked in the hotspots of the refugee crisis in Hungary, Slovenia, and Greece in 2015 and 2016.