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Signed Victor Vasarely, Sculpture, Felhoe,
1989
15.7in x 15.3in x
1.9 in
Biography of Victor Vasarely
Victor Vasarely
(1906 - 1997)
Internationally
recognized as one of the most important artists of the 20th century.
Victor Vasarely is the acknowledged leader of the Op Art movement, and
his innovations in color and optical illusion have had a strong
influence on many modern artists.
In 1947, Vasarely
discovered his place in abstract art. Influenced by his experiences at
Breton Beach of Belle Isle, he concluded that "internal
geometry" could be seen below the surface of the entire world. He
conceived that form and color are inseparable. "Every form is a
base for color, every color is the attribute of a form." Forms
from nature were thus transposed into purely abstract elements in his
paintings. Recognizing the inner geometry of nature, Vasarely wrote,
"the ellipsoid form...will slowly, but tenaciously, take hold of
the surface, and become its raison d'etre. Henceforth, this ovoid form
will signify in all my works of this period, the 'oceanic feeling'...I
can no longer admit an inner world and another, an outer world, apart.
The within and the without communicate by osmosis, or, one might rather
say: the spatial-material universe, energetic-living, feeling-thinking,
form a whole, indivisible... The languages of the spirit are but the
supervibrations of the great physical nature."
Victor Vasarely
was born in Pecs, Hungary in 1906. After
receiving his baccalaureate degree in 1925, he began studying art at the
Podolini-Volkmann Academy in Budapest. In 1928, he transferred to
the Muhely Academy, also known as the Budapest Bauhaus, where he studied
with Alexander Bortnijik. At the Academy, he became familiar with the
contemporary research in color and optics by Jaohannes Itten, Josef
Albers, and the Constructivists Malevich and Kandinsky.
After his first
one-man show in 1930, at the Kovacs Akos Gallery in Budapest,
Vasarely moved to Paris.
For the next thirteen years, he devoted himself to graphic studies. His
lifelong fascination with linear patterning led him to draw figurative
and abstract patterned subjects, such as his series of harlequins,
checkers, tigers, and zebras. During this period, Vasarely also created
multi-dimensional works of art by super-imposing patterned layers of
cellophane on one another to attain the illusion of depth.
In 1943, Vasarely
began to work extensively in oils, creating both abstract and
figurative canvases. His first Parisian exhibition was the following
year at the Galerie Denise Rene which he helped found. Vasarely became
the recognized leader of the avant-garde group of artists affiliated
with the gallery.
In 1955, Galerie
Denise Rene hosted a major group exhibition in connection with
Vasarely's painting experiments with movement. This was the first
important exhibition of kinetic art and included works by Yaacov Agam,
Pol Bury, Soto, and Jean Tinguely, among others.
During the
1950's, Vasarely wrote a series of manifestos on the use of optical
phenomena for artistic purposes. Together with his paintings and
Vasarely prints, these were a significant influence on younger artists.
According to the artist, "In the last analysis, the picture-object
in pure composition appears to me as the last link in the family
'paintings,' still possessing by its shining beauty, an end in itself.
But it is already more than a painting, the forms and colors which
compose it are still situated on the plane, but the plastic event which
they trigger fuses in front of and in the plane. It is thereby an end,
but also a beginning, a kind of launching pad for future
achievements."
Today, Victor
Vasarely's prints, paintings, collages and sculptures are celebrated in
numerous exhibits all around the world.
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