Sophie Taeuber-Arp, the Joy of Geometry
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This week, I'd like to introduce you to an artist I really love: Sophie Taeuber-Arp. Squares, circles, lines, bright colours, and lots of joy. For a long time, she was mostly remembered as "Jean Arp's wife". And yet she is one of the great pioneers of abstract art.
From textiles to painting
Sophie Taeuber was born in 1889 in Davos, Switzerland. She first trained in the applied arts, in St. Gallen and then in Munich: textiles, embroidery, weaving. From 1916 to 1929, she taught textile design at the School of Applied Arts in Zurich.
What I love is that she made no difference between "great art" and "decorative art". A cushion, a tapestry, a painting: for her, everything was a chance to play with colour and form.
Dada, puppets and dance
In 1915, in Zurich, she met the artist Jean Arp, whom she married in 1922. Together they took part in the Dada movement. Sophie danced, created puppets for the play King Stag in 1918, and made turned-wood "Dada heads", which are both funny and astonishingly modern.
Geometry as a game
From 1926 to 1928, with Arp and Theo van Doesburg, she designed the interiors of the Aubette in Strasbourg, a large entertainment venue with cinema, dance hall and bars, entirely covered in colourful geometric compositions. In 1929, the couple settled near Paris. She was part of the Abstraction-Création group and, in 1937, founded the magazine Plastique.
Her paintings are made of very simple shapes, and yet they are never cold. There is rhythm in them, almost music, and lots of lightness.
Why she speaks to me
If, like me, you love simple shapes and bright colours, you will also find them in my Pop Seventies paintings, for example Square Time.
And then there is her journey: a woman who worked with her hands, who mixed art and craft, and who took a long time to be recognised. That has changed: her portrait appeared on the Swiss 50-franc note, and in 2021 a major retrospective travelled to Basel, London and New York. Better late than never!
If you enjoyed this portrait, you can also rediscover Victor Vasarely and Sonia and Robert Delaunay.
And you?
Did you already know Sophie Taeuber-Arp? Which of her works do you prefer? Tell me on WhatsApp, I love talking about art with you.
In colour,
Lenon B
Contemporary painter, Ericeira, Portugal