Victor Vasarely’s Mind-Bending at Omer Tiroche LondonLondon’s Omer Tiroche Contemporary Art is showing a major survey of works by Victor Vasarely, the man widely regarded as the father of Op-art. Developed in collaboration with the in collaboration with the Fondation Vasarely, “Pour un Manifeste” coincides with the 110 anniversary of the artist’s birth and marks 40 years since the inauguration of his foundation.Tracing Vasarely’s career from his early abstract works of the 1950s right up to the end of his working life, the exhibition “illustrates one artist’s vision for a brighter future,” according to Gallery Director Omer Tiroche. “These works demonstrate the effect that optical illusions can have on the brain, dazzling with kaleidoscopic patterns that won’t sit still on the retina,” Tiroche explains.“Pour un Manifeste” was inspired by Vasarely’s “Notes Pour un Manifeste,” a controversial manifesto first published in 1955 alongside a group exhibition held at the Galerie Denise René in Paris. The manifesto challenged the roles of viewer and artist with new theories of kinetic plasticity and “art for all,” closing the distance between a modern consumer society and “high” art.According to Tiroche, Vasarely recognised that the love of patterns is an instinct that makes us feel safe, and so subverted this by removing all sense of control or predictability from the pattern. “In doing this, he hacked into the mechanics of a calculable world, challenging our set beliefs of perception and reality, provoking a double take,” says Tiroche.Highlights of the exhibition include rarely-seen examples of his intriguing coded “programmations” (instructions), for which the artist took inspiration from the shapes around him, shown alongside their full-colour acrylic or oil manifestations. And in keeping with the artist’s philosophy of “art for all,” the gallery is also selling a great selection of serigraphs to benefit the Fondation Vasarely.Tiroche conveys how certain colour combinations and contrasting shapes fall as patterns of light, overloading the viewer’s senses with more than can possibly be processed. “They hack into our complex physiological processes, revealing the brain’s attempts to construct a three-dimensional reality as it fills in the gaps itself,” he says.“For example, ‘Ondocto-Fa’ is based on a hexagonal grid, softly warping in tessellated shades of green, red and blue. The illusion is of walls swelling out towards you, causing a sense of vertigo as the centre seems to fall away. This composition triggers disconcerting associations as the swooping curves become the view from the top of a tall building, leaving you suddenly unstable.”Victor Vasarely: Pour un Manifeste is at Omer Tiroche Contemporary Art until May 20, 2016
↧