Gábor Szabó(I)

Szabo comes from a family of film makers. His father was also a director of photography, his mother was a dubbing director. Gábor Szabó graduated in 1975 from the Hungarian Academy of Theatre and Film Art. He was a student of György Illés, who taught cinematographers such as Academy Award winner Vilmos Zsigmond and László Kovács. As a Director of Photography, Szabó has made more than thirty feature films, shorts, documentaries, live-music concerts and many commercials, working with several well-known directors. He was the cinematographer of the Academy Award nominated Holocaust drama The Revolt of Job (1983), Vilmos Zsigmond's directorial debut The Long Shadow (1992). Since 1979, Gábor has been teaching at the University of Theatre and Film Arts (SZFE) and other universities. He led the highly successful Viewfinder International Joint Master's program here, until 2020, when the Hungarian government privatized SZFE and abolished the university's autonomy. This sparked significant international outrage, drawing solidarity from many artists, theaters, and universities. A substantial number of SZFE's original professors, including Gábor Szabó, departed from the institution as a result, leading to further consequences. The leadership of the Hungarian Society of Cinematographers (HSC) did not express solidarity with SZFE, resulting in the exit of the majority of the most prominent feature film cinematographers. They established a new association, the Hungarian Cinematographers Association (HCA), with Gábor Szabó elected as its president. Since then, Gábor has been prevented from working on Hungarian films funded by state subsidies in Hungary.