OND-KETT 1969

This is a painting of squares within squares by Victor Vasarely, probably made with acrylic or oil. I can imagine Vasarely standing in front of a canvas with all these colours, pushing and pulling each square to make this optical illusion. How long did it take him to decide on which colours to use? What kind of mathematical equations did he follow? It must have taken a lot of calculation. It’s kind of like a game of chess, each move impacts another. I love the push and pull of the squares. They bulge and shift, yet stay in perfect alignment. I'm reminded of Bridget Riley, also interested in abstraction. It’s interesting how artists riff on each other’s ideas. At the end of the day, painting is always about looking, thinking, and feeling. It involves trial and error, playing, and being open to surprise. It’s an embodied form of expression that embraces ambiguity and uncertainty. We can't know for sure what Vasarely was thinking, but his painting invites us to engage with it imaginatively and creatively.