Ronay was born in Budapest, one of five children. His father was a Romanian Jew and his mother a Catholic from Hungary. In 1915 the family moved first to Berlin and then, after a brief return to Budapest (1918), they settled in Vienna (1922).

In 1931 Ronay won the State Prize for Painting (1931) for Monks and Nuns, a work depicting a high profile orgy that took place in Austria.

In 1928, Ronay was invited to study at the Kunstgewerbe Schule under Professor Eugene Steinhof. In 1931 Ronay won the State Prize for Painting (1931) for Monks and Nuns, a work depicting a high profile orgy that took place in Austria. The award was subsequently revoked due to the content.

Ronay spent most of his life working in the family business, designing and decorating porcelain jewellery. Most of his artwork was completed before he came to in England in 1936. In England he established ‘Ronay Studios’ in St Peter’s Square, Hammersmith where he held an exhibition in 1943.

The following year (1944) Ronay married Czech-born Anita Jellinek in Chiswick. They had a son, Andrew and a daughter, Barbara. During the 1950s and 1960s Ronay mostly painted landscapes of the English counryside but in the 1970s reverted to carving. Ronay’s work has been exhibited at the Vienna Secession and The Royal Academy of Arts, London. Ronay died in 1998.