Lomholt Mail Art Archive

Index: Istvan Kantor

Biography

Istvan Kantor is a Canadian performance and video artists, industrial and electro pop singer and founder of Neoism. He is also known as Monty Cantsin. Kantor was born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1949, where he studied medicine. In 1976 he emigrated to Montreal via Paris. He is currently at home in Toronto, where in the 1990s his three children Jericho, Babylon, and Nineveh were born.

His main theme is the struggle for individuality in a technological society. During the last three decades, he was often arrested for his guerrilla operations in museums. He also received many awards, including the Telefilm Canada Award for Best Canadian Film (1998), the Transmediale Award (2001) in Berlin, the Governor General’s Award for Visual and media arts (2004) and the European Media Art Award (2009) in Osnabrück.

In the 1970s he was part of the underground art scene around Laszlo Beke in Communist Budapest. In 1976 he met American mail artists David Zack at Budapest Art Club, who then toured with his mail art Collektion through Europe. Encouraged by Zack, he emigrated to Montreal. In 1978 he lived with Zack and Al Blaster Ackerman in Portland, Oregon, where he work with both mail artists and artists from the Industrial music scene. Kantor was one of the many, to whom Zack suggested to adopt the multiple identity of Monty Cantsin, but only Kantor took up this proposal seriously and adopted the Cantsin identity to the point where it became chiefly associated with him. In Montreal, he organized the mail art show The Brain in the Mail (1979) and brought together young people from around the world under the term Neoism, who collectively used the Monty Cantsin identity.

Kantor’s most famous work of the late 1970s and early 1980s was his Blood Campaign, a continuous performance in which he threw his own blood on walls, screens or at the audience, often in combination with his own electro-songs, that mixed elements of New Wave, Industrial and Hungarian folklore. They are considered a subtle travesty of the performances of the Vienna Actionists. Often he used his own blood to paint a big X on the walls of modern museums. In 2004, he threw a vial of blood on a wall beside a sculpture of Michael Jackson by Paul McCarthy in the Hamburger Bahnhof, Museum for Contemporary Art in Berlin.

Projects

1979 The Brain in the Mail

Links

http://www.istvankantor.com
Mail Artists Index: http://mailartists.wordpress.com/2010/09/04/istvan-kantor-monty-cantsin/

1 - 48 of 103 posts by the networker in Lomholt Mail Art Archive
S 1977 00 00 kantor exchangeable photo 001
1977-00-00
Exchangeable Photo, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 06 00 kantor 001
1978-06-00
We are here, 0002
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 00 00 kantor 8 slides 001
1979-00-00
8 Slides
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 01 07 kantor 001
1979-01-07
Letter to Kantor's friend
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 08 12 kantor 001
1979-08-12
Monty Cantsin's Latvian Punk Rock
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 00 00 kantor exchangeable photo no 2 001
1980-00-00
Exchangeable Photo
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 05 00 kantor 001
1980-05-00
Art is total negation of life
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 09 17 kantor apt festival catalogue lfp in montreal 001
1980-09-17
APT 80
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 00 00 kantor mr klein songbook 001
1978-00-00
Mr Klein Songbook
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 06 28 kantor 001
1978-06-28
Send Some Sounds
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 00 00 kantor a proepos 001
1979-00-00
a Proepos
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 04 14 kantor 001
1979-04-14
Creveau à La Poste (Mail Art)
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 08 25 kantor 001
1979-08-25
The Neo, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 01 00 kantor 001
1980-01-00
Krononautic Divector Field
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 05 03 kantor 001
1980-05-03
Citoyens sculpteurs de Chicoutimi
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 09 17 kantor apt festival lfp in montreal 001
1980-09-17
APT 80
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 00 00 kantor sydneys concealment 001
1978-00-00
Sydney's Concealment
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 07 21 kantor 001
1978-07-21
The International Street Myth Blues Band & Monty Cantsin, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 00 00 kantor mr klein coordinate publication 001
1979-00-00
Mr Klein Coordinate
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 05 15 kantor 001
1979-05-15
Red Supper Ceremony, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 09 13 kantor 001
1979-09-13
The Neo, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 02 00 kantor 001
1980-02-00
Modern Myth - Portraits and Other Traits from David Zack
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 05 18 kantor 001
1980-05-18
Musée - Une action d'art postal de Monty Cantsin
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 10 00 kantor 001
1980-10-00
Organ Occupation Neoiste
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 03 25 kantor prison 001
1978-03-25
Prison, 0011
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 10 16 kantor the trans quiet dressingroom 001
1978-10-16
The Trans-Quiet Dressingroom
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 01 00 kantor 001
1979-01-00
Bravo you are the millionth neoist, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 06 01 kantor 001
1979-06-01
Brain in the Mail
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 10 00 kantor 001
1979-10-00
The Neo
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 02 09 kantor 001
1980-02-09
Kantor Photos
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 06 04 kantor 001
1980-06-04
Restrikzion Total Media performance
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 10 28 kantor 001
1980-10-28
Hyprofile APT' 80 - A Neoist Para-Festival
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 03 28 kantor 001
1978-03-28
Hug the world in the metro, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 12 19 kantor 001
1978-12-19
Brain-Building & Cerebrite - Project by Cso Kantor
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 01 01 kantor 001
1979-01-01
Brain Mail, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 06 03 kantor 001
1979-06-03
Super Official Manifestation of Neoism, 0003, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 10 31 kantor 001
1979-10-31
Hallowmass Supper, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 02 14 kantor 001
1980-02-14
Monty Cantsin's
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 09 00 kantor 001
1980-09-00
Apartment festival Montreal
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 10 31 kantor 001
1980-10-31
Letter to Lomholt
Istvan Kantor
S 1978 05 07 kantor 001
1978-05-07
Intercontinental Correspondence Show 1978, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 00 00 kantor 001
1979-00-00
The Neo, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 01 06 kantor 001
1979-01-06
International Mail Art Exhibition
Istvan Kantor
S 1979 06 05 kantor 001
1979-06-05
Super Official Manifestation of Neoism, 0014
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 00 00 kantor exchangeable photo no 1 001
1980-00-00
Exchangeable Photo
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 04 10 kantor 001
1980-04-10
The Neo
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 09 17 kantor 001
1980-09-17
NEO Apt '80 - International Apartment Festival 1980
Istvan Kantor
S 1980 11 08 kantor 001
1980-11-08
Invitation from Kantor
Istvan Kantor