“faces conceled in gold” exhibition
in the museum of ethnography in budapest, 2008
The first important exhibition : “Faces conceled in Gold” from the Collection of Dr. Zelnik” took place in the Museum of Ethnography in Budapest, 2008. The exhibition presented one important part of the Asian Gold Masks Collection – 27 funeral and ritual gold masks. The Scorpion Masks – the king and the queen scorpions are probably the highest attributes of power of a lost kingdom in Southeast Asia – unique pieces in the world. The 5th Gold Liao Mask in the world was also one of the highlights of the exhibition.
ca mau chinese shipwreck porcelain /1723-1735/
The Ca Mau Shipwreck Porcelain collection of Dr. Zelnik is the second larges collection of the world. The basic collection is in the Museum of History/Vietnam/Hanoi. The Chinese cargo ship transporting over 130 thousand export porcelain items mostly from the Jingdezhen factory/Jiangxi province and also from Fujian and Guandong provincies had sunk probably around 1725 by the Ca Mau Cape in South Vietnam.
The Ca Mau ceramics collection of Dr. Zelnik is a fine selection of more than 500 pieces and offers an excellent overvieuw of the composition of the Ca Mau finds with great diversity and rarity. The most exceptional pieces are the sea statues – a co-creation of time and nature. These arrangements are formations of Chinese ceramics that fell into their watery graves unusually moulded together with sea corals and shells. They are bizarr naturally evolved compositions in which ceramics created by the human hand are interwoven with nature’s creative elements.
The Ca Mau Chinese Export Porcelain Exhibition took place in Budapest and Zalakaros with a great succes in 2012.
The collection is presented in 2 representative albums : “The Ca Mau Shipwreck Porcelain from the Collection of Dr. Zelnik” Vol.1 – Vol.2, Budapest, 2012, 2014.