TAMÁS St. TURBA, NETRAF, 2026
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Tamás St. Turba, also known as Tamás St. Auby, Tamás Szentjóby, Staub, Stjóby, Stauby, Emmy/Emily Grant, St. Aubsky, T. Taub, St. Ruby, etc. began a non-art-art activity as soon as he ended his art activities in 1966. From that period on, he created an extensive oeuvre made up of actions, happenings, objects, concrete/visual/action-poems, images, compositions, sculptures, photos, videos, mail art and email art. Disseminating happenings and Fluxus ideas he deems himself a Neo-Socialist Realist.

The protests and art activities of Tamás St. Turba – aka Tamás St. Auby – in the late 50’s were heavily embedded in the shadow of the Sovjet umbrella. He became familiar with the ideas of Dada and the later Fluxus movement, and thus found his allies.
‘In the mid-’60s, the idea of Joseph Beuys, George Maciunas, and others about “everybody is an artist” proved to me that I’m not alone at the grassroots level. This conviction was in organic symbiosis with socialist/communist ideology, so I propagated Fluxus as Neo-Socialist-Realism, and established the International Parallel Union of Telecommunications (IPUT) in 1966, a Big Sister institution to counterbalance the power of the International Telecommunication Union, which controls the totality of the electromagnetic spectrum deeply into interstellar space as well.’ Interview with Jon Hendricks in MoMA Post notes on Art, 19 December 2018

In 1969, he organized the first Fluxus concert in Budapest. His work often challenged political and social norms, leading to his expulsion from Hungary in 1975. He settled in Switzerland and returned to Hungary in 1991.

In 2004, Tamás St. Auby showed several works in a group exhibition ‘Freedom Borders’ in Galerie van Gelder. During the installation he told me his view on the Hungarian society. Once back in his country after his exile, he discovered that although the political leaders from the communist era had been removed from their positions, the elite in the lower echelons (with their more than dubious or corrupt Stasi behavior in the past) had once again secured influential positions. To this day, he challenges unstoppable political and social norms in Hungary.