Victor Vasarely

Victor Vasarely (Hungary, 1908-France,1997), Vásárhelyi Győző, renamed in France as Victor Vasarely, was the father of Op art, an abstract artistic trend developed especially in the 1960s, which is based on optical effects to achieve images that simulate movement and all sorts of optical illusions.
In the early 1930s he settled in Paris, where he worked as a graphic designer for advertising agencies. After a period of figurative expression, he opted for a constructive and geometric abstract art. Beginning his main artistic research: around geometric abstract art, which provides optical effects of movement. Vasarely called this development visual kinetics (cinétique plastique) and based on the perception of the viewer who, in the end, is considered the only creator of the work.
From 1948 he exhibited regularly at the Denise René gallery and in the fifties he introduced new materials in his work (aluminum, glass) and began to make works of integration with space, such as Homage to Malevich. He received the Guggenheim International Prize in 1964 and the Grand Prize at the Sao Paulo Biennial in 1965. During these years he produced two-dimensional works that visually suggest movement and three-dimensional works that require the viewer to move in order to produce a kinetic effect. At the end of the sixties he receives new recognitions for his work, such as the Painting Award of the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburg. In 1970 the Vasarely Didactic Museum was inaugurated at the Château de Gordes in Vaucluse and in 1976 the Vasarely Foundation was inaugurated in Aix-en-Provence.