Eszter Metzing – Lymph

Eszter Metzing's window installation explores the lymphatic system—the body's defence and filtration mechanism—through soft, organic forms in felted wool, cotton, and glass. About Eszter Metzing's installation is entitled Lymph, a term referring to the translucent bodily fluid circulating between tissues, which, as the body's internal water, permeates and connects everything. In its archaic, folk meaning, it also denotes damp, moist earth, thus evoking both the interior of the body and the landscape, water and earth. Lymph is an intimate fluid belonging to the body's hidden, invisible layers, which we can now nevertheless glimpse through the shop window glass. With this work, the artist seeks to create a sensory situation that, through the visual experience, awakens the viewer's skin awareness, their desire to touch, and an awareness of their own gaze. Distance thus makes the absence of touch perceptible. At the same time, it invites the viewer to move beyond a human-centred perspective and to take notice of the presence of non-human beings, materials and water in our shared existence. One of the central themes of the installation is the tension between the desire to touch and the inability to do so, a tension further heightened by the characteristics of the Cairo display: the work can only be viewed through the glass wall. This wall is transparent, so the forms and the presence are visually perceptible; at the same time, it sets a boundary, separates and conceals. The installation adopts the inviting gesture of the shop window's traditional function and imbues it with gestures of exploration, revelation and initiation. Intimacy here has a dual meaning. On the one hand, the soft, organic, body-like form, with the 'moisture seeping from it', offers a sight that may make the viewer feel it is forbidden, perhaps indecent, and something they are not entitled to see. On the other hand, the work also builds on the interplay between secretly desired voyeurism and the possibility of being observed, through which the viewer is involuntarily cast into the role of the secret observer, thereby reinforcing the intimacy of what is 'spied upon'. The lymphatic system is the body's defence and filtration system, the medium of exchange between the internal and the external. Thus it is linked to the skin, the permeable membrane, and the separating yet transparent wall of the shop window. The process, however, cannot be completed: there is no entry, no direct encounter. The tension between desire and prohibition – arising from the nature of the exhibition space – persists day and night. In terms of materials, the installation is a mostly white, continuous, sprawling "body" composed of felted wool, cotton canvas, and faux fur, in which elements made of borosilicate glass evoke the circulation of an internal fluid and its seepage to the surface. Eszter Metzing graduated in 2018 from the Hungarian University of Fine Arts with a degree in graphic art, and her embroidered final-year project, entitled Inner Garden, already attracted considerable professional attention. She is an artist at the INDA Gallery, where she held major solo exhibitions in 2021 and 2024. Her work has been featured in group exhibitions at, amongst others, the Hungarian National Gallery (Intertwined, 2025), the Kastner Kommunity (Everyone was a child, 2024) and the Lajos Vajda Studio in Szentendre (I Surfaced From a Deep, Swampy Sleep, 2026). Abroad, she has exhibited in Paris, London, Brussels, Novi Sad and the Polish town of Ustka. The latter was part of the Baltic Contemporary Art Gallery's two-month residency programme (2026). She also took part in the Styrian Artist in Residence programme in Graz (2025), the Artist-in-Residence Programme in Salzburg (2025), and the KAIR Košice Artist in Residence programme in Slovakia (2026). Curator: Gábor Pintér Supported by Erzsébetváros Municipality, Hungarian Academy of Arts Cooperation partner: Bischitz Johanna Integrated Human Service Centre Related event: 2026.11.27.–29. Art Weekend Budapest, guided tour Read more Toggle Installation Mixed media