The Museum of Fine Arts – Vasarely Museum’s exhibition CLAIRE – Metamorphoses is the first solo exhibition in Budapest dedicated to the work of Claire Vasarely (1909–1990), a Hungarian-born artist who lived and worked in France. The exhibition draws on the Janus Pannonius Museum’s collection of over forty works, documentation of artworks held in French private collections, archival sources, and the latest Hungarian–French art-historical research.
Klára Spinner began her career in the milieu of the interwar Hungarian avant-garde. Before the age of twenty, her work had already been exhibited in Budapest. She subsequently explored the visual language of modern graphic design at the Műhely (lit. Workshop), led by Sándor Bortnyik. After moving to Paris, she designed patterns for silk manufacturers in Lyon, and from 1947 worked with François Tabard’s long-established weaving workshop in Aubusson, contributing to the post-war revival of French tapestry. In the tapestries of the artist, who was by then exhibiting under the name Claire, figurative imagination and abstract form come together: fantastical creatures and imaginary cities emerge through geometric composition and bold colour contrasts.
Claire and Victor Vasarely’s artistic careers were closely intertwined from the outset. The couple’s shared work in graphic and textile design, together with their workshop practices in Paris and Arcueil, raises complex questions of artistic collaboration and authorship. In the late 1950s, Claire Vasarely’s artistic and exhibition activity came to an unexpected end, while she assumed an increasingly important role in organising her husband’s international career and realising major museum projects.
While Victor Vasarely became a leading figure of international abstraction, Claire’s distinctive and independent artistic practice, recognized by the art world of her time, remained overlooked in art-historical narratives for decades. Metamorphoses brings this multifaceted oeuvre back into view, while drawing attention to the traditional boundaries between fine and applied arts, as well as questions of individual authorship and the visibility of women artists.
Curator: Judit Vörös
Venue: Musée Vasarely de Budapest, 1033 Budapest, Szentlélek tér 6.