Vajda Lajos Házak Besszögellésel 1935 

Vajda Lajos created this intriguing, untitled ink drawing of houses in 1935. It’s a moment frozen in time, just before the horrors of the Second World War engulfed Europe, and before Vajda's tragic death in 1941. The drawing’s stark lines and geometric forms suggest a world built on certainties, yet the unsettling perspective hints at an underlying instability. Are these houses homes, or just structures? Vajda, a Hungarian Jewish artist, made this work during a period of rising antisemitism and fascism, so it's possible these houses represent the precariousness of belonging and identity. The almost childlike simplicity of the drawing belies the complex emotions it evokes: a sense of longing, displacement, and perhaps, a quiet defiance in the face of looming darkness. Vajda’s houses invite us to consider the spaces we inhabit, and the stories they hold. They speak to the silent anxieties that linger beneath the surface of everyday life, then and now.