Thursday, December 21, 2017

Artist of the day, December 21: Victor Vasarely, Hungarian–French painter (op art)

Victor Vasarely ( born Vásárhelyi Győző, 1906 –1997), was a Hungarian–French artist, who is widely accepted as a "grandfather" and leader of the op art movement. His work entitled Zebra, created in the 1930s, is considered by some to be one of the earliest examples of op art.

Vasarely was trained as an artist in Budapest in the Bauhaus tradition. In 1930 he left Hungary and settled in Paris, where he initially supported himself as a commercial artist but continued to do his own work. During the 1930s he was influenced by Constructivism, but by the 1940s his characteristic style of painting animated surfaces of geometric forms and interacting colors had emerged. His style reached maturity in the mid-1950s and 1960s, when he began using brighter, more vibrant colors to further enhance the suggestion of movement through optical illusion.
Vasarely became a naturalized French citizen in 1959. Much of his work is housed in the Vasarely Museum at the Château de Gourdes, in southern France, and in the Vasarely Museum in Budapest. In 1970 he established the Vasarely Foundation, which in 1976 took up quarters near Aix-en-Provence in a building that he designed.

In 1927 Vasarely began his artistic training at a private drawing school in Budapest. One year later he joined the training centre 'Mühely' (German 'workshop') which was run by Sándor Bortnyik and taught the ideas of the Bauhaus. After moving to Paris in 1930 Vasarely was successful as a graphic designer and systematically explored the optical and emotional scope of the different graphic techniques. This led to his understanding in 1947 that geometric forms could evoke a sensory perception conveying new ideas of space, matter and energy. He developed his own geometric form of abstraction, which he varied to create different optical patterns with a kinetic effect. The artist makes a grid in which he arranges geometric forms in brilliant colours in such a way that the eye perceives a fluctuating movement. This was a major contribution to the development of Op Art. The decoration of Caracas University in 1954 was the beginning of Vasarely's active support of art in public spaces. He designed murals of metal and ceramic, mainly for buildings in France. He exhibited works regularly at the documenta in Kassel between 1955 and 1968. The official spiral-shaped logo of the 20th Olympic games in Munich was designed by Vasarely. In 1976 the artist founded the Fondation Vasarely in Aix-en-Provence which supported the creation of an institute for contemporary design and architecture in 1981. The Vasarely Museum in the artist's birth-town Pécs was opened in 1976, followed by the opening of a second museum in Zichy Palace in Budapest in 1987.



Mr Victor Vasarely

Museum Fondation Vasarely in Aix-en-Provence
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1950, Zebra
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1952, Zint
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1953, Olbio II
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1959, Biadan
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1959, Pleionne
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1959-61, Supernovae
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1960, alphabet-vb
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1960-63, Geta
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1963, keiho
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1964, Noir et Blanc
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1964, Planetary folklore participations
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1965, EG 1-2
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1965, Toll (from the Permutations Series)
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1966, Boglar II
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1967, Duo-2
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1967, Relief Multicolor No. 2
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1968 Vega 200
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1968, Na II A
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely


1969, Planetary Folklore Participations No. 1
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1969, Vega Nor
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1970,  Kezdi
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1970, Gestalt-7
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1970, Untitled 16
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1972, AXO - NEW YORK
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1973 Folkokta
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1975, Citra, edition 40-250
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1975, Optical Cube
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1975, Vonal Fèny
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1976, Untitled Serigraph
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1978, Vega Szem
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1980, Sange
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1981, Pictor
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1982, Jamy
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1983, O4 NN-2
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1985, Titan A
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1988, Pava Year
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1989, Tsikos-A ( Stripes-A)
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

1989-90, Kezdi
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Composición abstracta 17
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Gestalt I Series
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

hand painted acrylic on wood, sculpture collection
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Maamor, Wool tapestry,
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Mexico city (Michel Bergeron private collection)

Olimpic games
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Vega (Michel Bergeron private collection)

Pauk Army
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Rhombus
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Sem Título
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Tuz
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Vas Vega
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Vega Nor Improvisation 2
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Vega Haromszor
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely
Vega Kontosh Va
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

Vega
© 2017, Fondation Vasarely

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