Let’s talk about Vasarely. Does his name bring psychedelic forms and colors shifting in front of your eyes? Or if you are French, do you think of the Renault logo? Yes, Vasarely designed it with his son in 1972! Are you ready to experience powerful optical illusions from an OpArt genius? If you are in Paris, you are in luck as a big retrospective opened this week at Centre Pompidou. If you are based elsewhere, let me take you on a visual and colorful tour, sharing my visit of the Fondation Vasarely from last October. Born in 1908 in Hungary, at the age of 20 Victor Vasarely became a student of Graphic Arts under Alexander Bortnyik who had set up a school in the spirit of the Bauhaus. Mondrian and his Neoplasticism, Malevich and his Constructivist approach but also Ostwald’s Color Theory were studied and practiced upon by young Vasarely. These theories and artistic movements all informed Vasarely’s approach to Applied Art. Yet in 1930, he decided to move to Paris to put his graphic talent at the service of Advertising rather than Art. This is telling you already that Vasarely looked beyond what he perceived as the narrow world […]
Seeing two Miró tapestries making the news for being restored in record time to make the opening of a focused exhibition in Venice after the Serenissima suffered one of its worst floods in years, reminded me of all the beautiful tapestries I have recently had the privilege to put my eyes on. Perhaps we too often think of tapestries as an antiquated art form, hovering on the walls of darkened galleries, so I am hoping to change your view just a little, after I share a few of my recent art adventures in pictures. But before we get to this beauty…