Born Klára Spinner (1909–1990), this French-Hungarian artist trained at the Műhely in Budapest — then nicknamed the “Hungarian Bauhaus” — where she met Victor Vasarely, whom she married in 1931. There she explored drawing, advertising, fashion and textiles. From this education emerged a multifaceted practice at the crossroads of craft, applied arts and fine art.
In partnership with the Vasarely Museum in Pécs, Hungary, the exhibition invites visitors into a dazzling world that oscillates between figuration and abstraction, shining a light on the work of an artist who remains all too little known. Advertisements, tapestries, collages, portraits, self-portraits… more than a hundred works and previously unseen archives reveal her keen eye and distinctive style in a chronological journey structured around the various techniques she employed during her thirty years of creation.
Her serial motifs of geometric forms, combined with surprising colour contrasts, foreshadow op art through their powerful optical effects. Victor Vasarely himself would later acknowledge that Claire was a major source of inspiration for his own work and that she played a significant role in the emergence of the movement. Drawing also on nature for her floral designs, as well as on Hungarian folklore, medieval tales and Transylvanian legends, she conjured a world that is richly layered and deeply colourful. The exhibition also highlights her past as a fashion journalist and her collaborations with Lyon silk manufacturers and other renowned textile industries, further demonstrating her bold sense of colour. Claire Vasarely’s unique career — woven from multiple influences — traces the outline of a free and visionary body of work.
Claire Vasarely: A Life in Colour, until 15 February 2026 at the Vasarely Foundation, 1 avenue Marcel Pagnol, Aix-en-Provence. Open daily from 10am to 6pm in summer, and from Wednesday to Sunday, 10:30am to 5:30pm, the rest of the year.