This globally renowned photographer has been taking photos since he was ten years old. At the age of sixteen, he won a gold medal at a national photography exhibition, and his first works were published in the Swiss magazine Camera. After completing his university studies, he worked as a professional photographer for the weeklies Svět v obrazech and Domov a svet. He was also a fashion photographer in Bratislava and Prague, and later for a long time in Berlin and Paris. In addition, he cooperated with prestigious foreign magazines such as GEO, Stern, Merian, and Paris Match.
As a member of the German Bielderberg society, he brought "news in photos" from Africa, Indonesia, Thailand, Australia, the USA and Russia. His images of old Bratislava, its streets, summer days on the Danube embankment, and the iconic photo of nuns with their backs turned looking at the city were extremely popular, and his book Bratislava moja (My Bratislava) is comprised of photos featuring Kállay’s unique perspective. Furthermore, he demonstrated his love for Prague in Franz Kafka a Praha (Franz Kafka and Prague).
Kállay tried to capture something new, in places where others had not been, and when searching for a subject he remembered the advice of photographer Karol Hájek: “Try to look at things from a different perspective than everyone else.” Last but not least, he remembers meeting an old woman on the Trans-Siberian Railway. She asked him where he was from, what his nationality was, and whether he believed in God. He answered her, but it didn’t seem as if she was listening. After a pause she said, “But it doesn’t matter who you are, the important thing is that there is no war.” It was a conversation that he would never forget, and was probably more important to him than the photo he took to remember her face. His photographs have been exhibited in prestigious galleries all over the world.
Born on April 26, 1926 in Čadca, Karol Kállay studied at the high school in Trenčín, and later at the University of Economics. He devoted his entire life to photography. He died on August 4, 2012 at the age of 86 in Bratislava. His first book, Slovenské rieky (Slovak Rivers), was published in 1954. This was followed by nearly 50 more, the most famous are those about Los Angeles, New York, Tokyo, Rome, Mexico, and Slovakia. Pieseň o Slovensko (Song of Slovakia) and Los Angeles received several awards, including the UNESCO Prize as the most beautiful book in the world. For the book Kafka und Prag, he won the 1995 Most Beautiful Book of Slovakia award. He presented his work at over 80 solo exhibitions at home and abroad (Prague, Berlin, New York, Moscow, Budapest, Warsaw, Bucharest, Sofia, Paris, Hamburg, Baghdad, Cairo, Osaka, Istanbul, Havana) and received many awards, including the Pribina Cross of the 1st class, for his lifetime achievement, GEO magazine's Photographer of the Year in Germany, EFIAP title holder in Switzerland, and the Leopold J. Danihels Award for his artistic activities in Los Angeles.
