Vera Molnár
Vera Molnár | |
---|---|
![]() Still image from Encyclopédie audiovisuelle de l'art contemporain, 1996 | |
Born | 1924 (age 96–97) |
Education | |
Known for | Op art, computer art |
Website | www |
Vera Molnár (born 1924) is a French media artist of Hungarian origin. Molnar is widely considered to be a pioneer of computer art and generative art, and is also one of the first women to use computers in her art practice.[1]
Born in Hungary, she studied aesthetics and art history at the Budapest College of Fine Arts. In the 1940s and 50s, she created non-representational paintings. By 1959 she was making combinatorial images; in 1968 she would use a computer to create her first algorithmic drawings.
In the 1960s she founded two groups in France concerned with the use of technology within the arts: the Groupe de Recherche d’Art Visuel and Art et Informatique.
Her work has been widely collected by major museums; in 2007 she was named a Chevalier of Arts and Letters in France.
Life[]
Vera Molnár, born 1924 in Hungary, is one of the pioneers of computer and algorithmic arts. Trained as a traditional artist, Molnár studied for a diploma in art history and aesthetics at the Budapest College of Fine Arts. She iterated combinatorial images from as early as 1959.[2] In 1968 she began working with computers, where she began to create algorithmic paintings based on simple geometric shapes and geometrical themes.[3]
Work[]
Molnár created her first non-representational images in 1946. These were abstract geometrical and systematically determined paintings. In 1947 she received an artists’ fellowship to study in Rome at the Villa Giulia, and shortly after moved to France, where she currently resides.
In the 1960s, Molnár co-founded several artist research groups. The first, in 1960, was Groupe de Recherche d’Art Visuel, which investigate collaborative approaches to mechanical and kinetic art.[4][5] The second was Art et Informatique, with a focus on art and computing.[6] Molnar learned the early programming languages of Fortran and Basic, and gained access to a computer at a research lab in Paris where she began to make computer graphic drawings on a plotter.
Legacy[]
Molnár was part of an exhibit, On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century at the Museum of Modern Art, which demonstrates the history of drawing lines.[7][8]
A 2015 retrospective exhibition called "Regarding the Infinite | Drawings 1950-1987" was held at Senior & Shopmaker Gallery in New York City.[9][10]
Awards[]
In 2005 Molnár received the DAM Digital Arts Award for her life’s work,[11] which includes €20,000 prize, and a cataloged exhibition.[12] Vera Molnár’s exhibit, (Un)Ordnung.(Dés)Ordre.[13] at the Museum Haus Konstruktiv shows her early freehand drawings never exhibited before, from her late-1960s to the new installation at Museum Haus Konstruktiv.[14][15]
She was appointed Chevalier of Arts and Letters (2007), and won the outstanding merit award AWARE in 2018.[citation needed]
Collections[]
- Frac Lorraine, France[16]
- Museum of Fine Arts Houston[17]
- Museum of Modern Art, New York City[18]
- , Waldenbuch, Germany[19]
- Morgan Library & Museum[20]
- National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.[21]
- Tate Museum, London[22]
- Victoria and Albert Museum, London[1]
References[]
- ^ a b Museum, Victoria and Albert. "Print | Molnar, Vera | V&A Explore The Collections". Victoria and Albert Museum: Explore the Collections.
- ^ "FIELD x Exploring art + technology to create new formats of visual communication". Field.io. Retrieved 2016-06-05.
- ^ "Artists :: Phase One :: Vera Molnar". DAM.org. Retrieved 2016-06-05.
- ^ Cubitt, Sean; Malina, Roger F. (2003). Women, Art, and Technology. MIT Press. ISBN 978-0-262-13424-8.
- ^ "Groupe de Recherche d'Art Visuel (GRAV) | ZKM". zkm.de.
- ^ "Vera Molnar | Database of Digital Art". Dada.compart-bremen.de. 1924-01-05. Retrieved 2016-06-05.
- ^ "Vera Molnar | MoMA". Museum of Modern Art. USA. Retrieved 2017-03-31.
- ^ Cotter, Holland (2010-12-01). "'On Line': Drawings Leap Off the Page at MoMA - Review". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-03-31.
- ^ "Senior & Shopmaker Gallery — Vera Molnar: Regarding the Infinite | Drawings 1950-1987". Seniorandshopmaker.com. Retrieved 2016-06-05.
- ^ "Vera Molnar Regarding the Infinite Drawings 1950-1987". www.artnet.com. Retrieved 2017-03-31.
- ^ "Vera Molnar - DDAA en". Ddaa-online.org. Retrieved 2016-06-05.
- ^ "|Ddaa| - Ddaa En". Ddaa-online.org. Retrieved 2016-06-05.
- ^ Museum Haus Konstruktiv (2015-02-16), Vera Molnar - (Un)Ordnung. (Dés)Ordre., retrieved 2017-03-31
- ^ team, Museum Haus Konstruktiv. "VERA MOLNAR(UN)ORDNUNG. (DES)ORDRE. 2017". www.hauskonstruktiv.ch. Retrieved 2017-03-31.
- ^ "Vera Molnar / Haus Konstruktiv Zurich". Elusive Magazine. Retrieved 2017-03-31.
- ^ "Collection FRAC Lorraine | Vera Molnar:Promenade (presque) aléatoire". collection.fraclorraine.org.
- ^ "Vera Molnar: Hypertransformation of 20 Concentric Squares". mfah.org.
- ^ "Vera Molnar | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art.
- ^ RITTER, MUSEUM. "Vera Molnar: Sammlung Marli Hoppe-Ritter - Sammlung Marli Hoppe-Ritter". www.museum-ritter.de.
- ^ "Morganmobile: Order and Disorder". The Morgan Library & Museum. 29 January 2021.
- ^ "Artist Info". www.nga.gov.
- ^ "'Transformations 1-21', Vera Molnar, 1976". Tate.
External links[]
- 1924 births
- Living people
- 20th-century French women artists
- 21st-century French women artists
- 20th-century Hungarian women artists
- 21st-century Hungarian women artists
- Artists from Budapest
- Hungarian emigrants to France
- French digital artists
- Women digital artists
- French contemporary artists
- Hungarian contemporary artists