Desiderius Orban

Desiderius Orban, OBE (née Orbán Dezső; 26 November 1884 – 4 October 1986) was a renowned Hungarian painter, printmaker and teacher, who, after emigrating to Australia in 1939 when in his mid-50s, also made an illustrious career in that country.

One of The Eight in Budapest, early 20th-century painters who were influential in introducing cubism, expressionism and Fauvism to Hungary, Orbán had been influenced by the paintings of Henri Matisse, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Cézanne, seen when he lived in Paris.

After building a substantial career, in 1939 after the rise of Nazi Germany and the invasion of Poland, he left Hungary and emigrated to Sydney.

They were taking a different direction from the older artists of the Nagybánya school, whose painters had worked at what is now Baia Mare, Romania and first brought impressionist and post-impressionist techniques to Hungary.

Other members of the group were Károly Kernstok, Béla Czóbel, Róbert Berény, Dezső Czigány, Ödön Márffy, Bertalan Pór, and Lajos Tihanyi.

With the rise of the Nazis, anti-Semitism and Fascism, in 1939 Orbán fled Budapest around the time of the German invasion of Poland and beginning of World War II.

His students in Australia included Harold Thornton, Yvonne Audette, Margo Lewers, John Olsen, Pat Kelk Graham, Ruth Faerber, Panni Roseth, Olive Hughes, John Coburn, Ruth Burgess, Virginia Cuppaidge, James Clifford (1936–1987), Aileen Rogers (1916–1994), Sheila McDonald, Hilary Cassidy, Mary Curtis and Tom Green (1913–1981).