Portrait medals form a significant part of Bory Jenő’s medallic oeuvre. The artist immortalised numerous colleagues, artist friends and fellow university professors in bronze.
The likenesses of Ede Balló, Aladár Edvi Illés and György Zala not only attest to the artist’s outstanding ability as a portraitist, but also commemorate defining figures of Hungarian artistic life in the period. Aladár Edvi Illés was a respected painter at the turn of the century and during the interwar years, known primarily for his genre paintings and scenes of everyday life; he also taught at the College of Fine Arts for many years. The painter and art educator Ede Balló ranked among the leading figures of Hungarian portrait painting, while the sculptor György Zala’s works include the Millennium Monument in Heroes’ Square, Budapest.
Bory also portrayed scholars and lecturers associated with the Royal Joseph University of Technology on his medals. Lajos Ilosvay, a chemical engineer and university professor, was a defining figure in chemical education and research, while Szilárd Zielinski entered the history of Hungarian engineering as a pioneer of reinforced-concrete construction and as the first Hungarian Doctor of Engineering. The water towers on Margaret Island and in Szeged, among other structures, were built to his designs. Adolf Czakó was a bridge engineer and rector of the university who played a major role in modernising engineering education. Bory’s portrait medals not only provide personal memorials to these distinguished artists and scholars, but also evoke Hungarian artistic and technical life in the first half of the twentieth century.