Turkiz, from Lapidaire 1968

Victor Vasarely's 'Turkiz' from Lapidaire is a print of blocks of color and geometrical shapes. I imagine Vasarely, like a playful architect, carefully placing each shape, each color, in conversation with the others. The bright reds and blues feel very alive. The texture is flat and smooth. What might it have been like to create this? I sympathize with the artist because it is a very careful process that demands high levels of patience. Notice how the blocks of color interact. The composition is so tight that the relationships between these colours create a tension. The red feels like it wants to break out of that square. The circles feel like they might roll right off the page! It makes me think of Josef Albers, and his own colour experiments. It is amazing how artists are in an ongoing conversation and exchange of ideas across time, inspiring one another’s creativity. I think painting is a form of embodied expression that embraces ambiguity and uncertainty, allowing for multiple interpretations and meanings over fixed or definitive readings.