Robert Delaunay

French painter and visionary Robert Delaunay was at the forefront of the modernist movement at the turn of the 20th century. As the Cubist movement gained momentum and the Fauves stunned the world with their audacious colors, he captured the essence of modernism with his cityscape canvases. While he painted with the language of the cubists, his subject matter was revolutionary. Returning again and again over the years to the Eiffel Tower, Delaunay painted the quintessential urban icon, instead of the recognizable pastoral landscape popular in his day. With a futurist dynamic, his canvases exploded with bold colors and sweeping gestures. In his work the chaos of the modern world was contained in the unity of composition and the fusion of color and light. Born in 1885 in Paris, Delaunay taught himself to paint landscapes and experimented with impressionistic scenery and pointillist styles. His formal study of color theory is evident in his later work as he progressed from the futuristic cityscape to almost complete abstraction. Delaunay stated, "These colored planes are the subject of the picture and nature is no longer a subject for description but a pretext." This later style of pure painting in the early 20th century further contributed to his reputation as an avant-garde artist and a truly revolutionary painter.

Robert Delaunay Images:
Circular Formes
Rythme Sans Fin