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Op Art & Design

April 5 2019 - May 11, 2019
hatchikian-gallery-exhibition-op-art-and-design-victor-vasarely

OP Art & Design, an exhibition of works by Victor Vasarely, founder of Optical Art.

“Op Art & Design”, exhibition of works by Victor Vasarely, founder of Optical Art. An exceptional hanging proposed by Hatchikian Gallery, bringing together preparatory drawings and serigraphs by Vasarely made in the years 1950 to 1980, while the Center Pompidou offered a retrospective of the artist.

Unpublished silkscreen prints by Victor Vasarely.

This exhibition designed by Audrey Hatchikian presents a rare set of serigraphs by the artist. Of exceptional quality, the works presented are dated from the years 1950 to 1980. This broad period of creation makes it possible to observe all the evolutions in the artistic practice of Victor Vasarely. From serigraphs inspired by the pebbles of Belle-île-en-Mer to those structured by the influences of the tiles of the Parisian metro, the exhibition is a journey through the pictorial language of the artist.

The birth of Op Art.

Research on the effects of optical sensation is gradually leading to those who experiment with the possibilities of movement in the artistic object (Kinetic Art). Vasarely can be considered as the leader of Op art since 1944, followed by artists like Jesús-Rafael Soto, Yaacov Agam, François Morellet, Karl Gerstner, Julio Le Parc, Getulio Alviani, Ángel Duarte. In America, Op art is presented to the public during the exhibition The Responsive Eye in New York in 1965. American artists such as Richard Anuszkiewicz, Kenneth Roland, Ellsworth Kelly, Michael Kidner, Larry Poons, Bridget Riley, relate to this movement through their works and their research on the optical properties of color.

A life devoted to artistic research.

French painter of Hungarian origin, Victor Vasarely (Pics, Hungary 1908 - Paris 1997) trained at the Muhely Academy in Budapest, a sort of Hungarian Bauhaus, under the direction of Bortnyk. In 1930, he moved to Paris and painted expressionist, cubist and surrealist canvases. He had his first exhibition at the D. René gallery in 1944, when the gallery was inaugurated. In 1947, in Belle-Isle, he turned towards abstraction by reducing pebbles and waves to ovoid shapes. In 1948, staying in Gordes, he radicalized his geometric language, and introduced an axonometric illusionist perspective (Santorin, 1950-51). Little by little, it evolves towards kinetics, the parallel lines shift, create reliefs or hollows, the square becomes rhombus, the round ellipse, the games of movement and vibration energize the composition during the "white and black period". From the mid-50s. From 1959, he developed the system of "plastic unity" and "departure prototype" (collage printed in serigraphy) to create multiples. From 1963, he approached volume through reliefs and used new materials such as aluminum and glass. He reintroduced color the following year, enriching his chromatic range with several shades and creating permutation systems programmed in advance (Arny, 1967-68, Paris, MNAM). From the start of his career, Vasarely went beyond easel painting by investing space (Homage to Malevich, 1954 ; Deep kinetic work in steel blade, 1967 ; Polychrome signal, 1972), by making tapestries woven in Aubusson, by making sculptures, kinetic grids ... He founded two educational museums in Gordes in 1970, in Pecs in 1976 and an architectural research center in Aix-en-Provence in 1976 .

“Indeed, we cannot leave the work of art to the only elite of connoisseurs. Present art is moving towards generous forms, which can be recreated at will; the art of tomorrow will be a common treasure or it will not be. »Victor Vasarely. Yellow Manifesto, 1955

Rare works.

The Op Art & Design exhibition also presents works of great rarity. TheAlbum n ° 1 is one of them. Dated 1955, this superb album brings together 12 serigraphs dating from 1948 to 1954. Previously exhibited at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, theAlbum n ° 1 is also accompanied by a remarkable text written by the hand of the artist. Three “programs” by the artist, little known to the general public, are also to be discovered. They have the particularity of highlighting Vasarely's method for creating his serigraphs.

Galerie d'images

Press Release
  • Date: 5 Apr 2019 - 11 May 2019
  • Location:Hatchikian - Secret Gallery, Paris
  • Curators:Audrey hatchikian

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