W01_Vera Molnar

Biographic data

Quotes from wikipedia, artist statements, descriptions, etc…

Born in Hungary in 1924, Vera Molnar is one of the first women artists to use computers in her practice. Trained as a traditional artist, she studied art history and aesthetics at the Budapest College of Fine Arts and moved to Paris in 1947, where she still lives.

She co-founded several pioneering artist research groups such as G.R.A.V. (Groupe de Recherche d'Art Visuel), which investigate collaborative approaches to mechanical and kinetic art, and the research group for art and computer science at the Institute of Art and Science in Paris.

Pre-dating the computer, she invented algorithms or “machine imaginaire” that allowed the creation of image series following a set of pre-ordained compositional rules. Beginning in 1968, the computer became a central device in the making of her paintings and drawings, allowing her to more comprehensively investigate endless variations in geometric shape and line.

Still active today at the young age of 95, she is the recipient of the first D.velop Digital Art Award (2005), was appointed Chevalier of Arts and Letters (2007), and won the outstanding merit award AWARE in 2018. (veramolnar.com)

Molnar believes one power of the computer is that the random can create an aesthetic shock that ruptures the systematic and symmetrical. The rigor and meticulousness which she applies to her logics, is the human bias that computation and randomness cannot create alone. The work is so powerful because the “randomness” exists within Molnar’s bias.

Molnar is a wonderful example of how the computer can be a powerful tool in the right hands. Her precise, sensitive modulations of placement and angles take minimalist ingredients and create a complex feast for the eyes. In 1968, she became one of the pioneers of computer use in artistic creation, a tool that, in her words, allowed her art to “free itself from a classical heritage sclerotic” while enabling her to maintain full control of her compositions. Vera Molnar today enriches an already renowned body of work with new systematic constructions in bright colors.

Moma: 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.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.

link to short biography
link to Vera Molnar’s Exploration of the Unimaginable

Started painting at the age of twelve, her first subject matter, nymphs and trees, inspired by an uncle. Soon progressed to more geometrical themes, and in 1968 started working with computers. Her work during this period focused on the breakup of repeating units, often expressed as a series of increasingly fractured images. In order to do away with what she calls "mental-cultural ready-mades," she employs different programmatic games and mathematical principles in order to produce series of work guided by a unifying quest for the invisible.

Vera Molnar holds that the computer can serve four purposes. The first concerns its technical promise---it widens the area of the possible with its infinite array of forms and colors, and particularly with the development of virtual space. Secondly, the computer can satisfy the desire for artistic innovations and thus lighten the burden of traditional cultural forms. It can make the accidental or random subversive in order to create an aesthetic shock and to rupture the systematic and the symmetrical. For this purpose a virtual data bank can be assembled. Thirdly, the computer can encourage the mind to work in new ways. Molnar believes that artists often pass far too quickly from the idea to the realization of the work. The computer can create images that can be stored for longer, not only in the data bank but also in the artist's imagination. Finally, Molnar thinks that the computer can help the artist by measuring the physiological reactions of the audience, their eye movements for example, thus bringing the creative process into closer accordance with its products and their effects. (Source)

Quotes

“I imagined I had a computer. I created a program and then, step by step, realized simple, limited series, which, though, were self-contained, thus not skipping any shape combination.”
“It's a paradox, but the people who argued at the beginning that using computers dehumanizes art... the opposite is true. Because it's thanks to all this technology that we can get very close to what we have imagined that we might not have found otherwise.” (Vera Molnar: Randomness https://vimeo.com/372579247)
“I am a painter, an image-maker, in particular, of images of a nonfigurative kind. I 'create' visual forms in the sense that they consist of combinations of shapes that cannot be found in nature.”

Artworks

Copy and paste images, embed videos, links for galleries of inspiring and descriptive artwork

http://www.veramolnar.com/

https://opheliaming.medium.com/vera-moln%C3%A1r-the-computer-art-goddess-26a84efbea4b

Spalter Digital Collection: https://spalterdigital.com/artists/vera-molnar/

Vera Molnár’s website: http://www.veramolnar.com/diapo.php?y=1985

My Mother’s Letters is an attempt at simulation, an artificial re-creation of the handwriting of Molnar’s mother.

“I was furious, and so I said, “I will go back to squares and rectangles, and I don’t want anything to do with Gaussian curves.” Ten years passed, fifteen maybe, and I had an exhibition in Aix-en-Provence. I opened my shutters, and what do I see? The Gaussian curve through Mont Sainte-Victoire.” (https://brownpoliticalreview.org/2020/05/bpr-interviews-vera-molnar/)

Machine Imaginaire

https://visitdebrecen.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/veramolnar7.jpg

Books and published work

What books inspired them? “When a few years ago, Vera Molnar bought a small notebook whose pages were each divided into four strips, Raymond Queneau's opus, One hundred thousand billion poems, may have come to mind. But Vera Molnar set her own rules here. With a gouache pen, using four different colours and four different thicknesses she drew, on about a hundred pages, outlines of Mount Sainte-Victoire so dear to Cézanne's heart.” (https://www.bernardchauveau.com/en/artists-books/230-vera-molnar-six-million-seven-hundred-and-sixty-five-thousand-and-two-hundred-and-one-sainte-victoire-9782363060617.html)

What books have they written?

Toward Aesthetic Guidelines for Paintings with the Aid of a Computer **

https://en.calameo.com/read/0045073284a4d3aed2145

Toward Aesthetic Guidelines for Paintings with the Aid of a Computer, 1975 📄 PDF Download

Exhibitions

Documentation, links, critics, comments about exhibitions related to the artist.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2020 Vera Molnar. Promenades en carré, 18. October 2020 – 11. April 2021, Museum Ritter, Waldenbuch, Germany 2019 Vera Molnar, MuDA, Zurich Disorder in Order, Kiscell Museum, Budapest Drawings and Paintings 1947 – 1986, Senior & Shopmaker Gallery, New York The 1980s, DAM GALLERY Berlin D’autres lignes, Galerie La Ligne, Zurich Retrospektive, Galerie Linde Hollinger, Ladenburg 2018 Véra Molnar. Une ligne, Musee de beaux-arts de Caen 2017 Spielerisch, Minimal, DAM Gallery, Berlin Quarte Vingt Treize (93), Bernard Chauveau/ Galerie 8+4, Paris, France 2016 1% de désordre ou la vulnérabilité de l’angle droit, Galerie Berthet-Aittouarès, Paris, Frankreich 2015 Papiers, Fondation Lius Moret, Martigny, Switzerland Regarding the Infinite – Drawings 1950 -1987, Senior & Shopmaker Gallery, New York, USA concentriue 1958 – 2012, März Galerie, Mannheim, Germany Vera Molnar. (Un)Ordnung. (Des)Ordre. Museum Haus Konstruktiv, Zürich, Switzerland 2014 Mes 90 ans à la Ligne, Galerie La Ligne, Zürich, Switzerland Solo, DAM GALLERY Berlin, Germany Vera Molnar. (Un)Ordnung. (Des)Ordre, Museum für Konkrete Kunst, Ingolstadt, Germany Née en 1924, Granville Gallery, Paris, France 2013 Tremblement, Collection Nationale de l´Edition et de l´Art Imprime, Paris, France Compredre, c´est transformer, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Vom sichtbaren zum lesbaren, Museum der Wahrnehmung (MUWA), Graz, Austria Une bréve histoire des lignes, Centre Pompidou Metz, France Errances, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France 2012 One Percent Disorder, Institut Kepes, Eger, Hungary Vera Molnar, Kunsthaus Rehau, Institut für Konstruktive Kunst und Konkrete Poesie, Rehau, Germany Vera Molnar, Une Rétrospective 1942 – 2012, Musée des Beaux Arts de Rouen, France 2011 Gothique, DAM GALLERY Berlin, Germany 86 (Part III), Galerie Torri, Paris, France 2010 86 (Part II), Galerie Torri, Paris, France 86, Galerie Torri, Paris, France Tourner en rond?, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France Variations Ste-Victoire, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Budapest, Hungary 60 ans de carrés, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France 2009 Perspectives et variations, Frac Lorraine, Metz, France Né en 1924, Galerie März, Mannheim, Germany 2008 Pliages, tableaux, dessins, Galerie März, Mannheim, Germany The early Beginnings – plotter drawings 1969 – 1990, DAM GALLERY Berlin, Germany Hommage à Dürer (with François Morellet), Musée Vasarely, Budapest, Hungary Hommage à Paul Klee, Galerie La Ligne, Zurich, Switzerland Hommage à Dürer, variations (with François Morellet), Musée de PAKS, Hungary 2007 Car je n’aime pas la couleur verte, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen, France Vers l’épure, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France M…, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Lignes, Galerie März, Ladenburg, Germany 2006 Parallèles (avec MCBA), Galerie La Ligne, Zurich, Switzerland Tableaux et séries, März Galerien, Ladenburg, Germany Vera Molnar, Etudes et multiples, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany Monotonie, symétrie, surprise, Kunsthalle Bremen, Bremen, Germany Histoires D’I, La Galerie Kandler, Toulouse, France Vera Molnar. Studien und Multiples, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany 2005 Droites et courbes, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France Vera Molnar, Galerie Charpa, Valencia, Spain Signes et signatures, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Vera Molnar et Marta Pan. Thèmes et variations, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Brest, France 2004 Grecques, après tremblement de terre, Artothèque, Auxerre, France M comme Malevitch und andere Buchstabenbilder, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany Vera Molnar. Als das Quadrat noch ein Quadrat war … Retrospektive zum 80. Geburtstag, Wilhelm-Hack-Museum, Ludwigshafen, Germany Vera Molnar et Julije Knifer. Lignes et méandres, Fondation pour l’art contemporain Claudine et Jean-Marc Salomon, Alex, France 2003 Hasards canalisés, Galerie Guttmann, Budapest, Hungary Dessins, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany 2002 Vera Molnar, Espace Fanal, Basel, Switzerland Variations, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Tableaux, März Galerien, Ladenburg, Germany Hasards preinèdites, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France 2001 Des chemins sinueux, März Galerien, Mannheim and Ladenburg, Germany Fragments de Méandres, Ungarisches Kulturinstitut, Stuttgart, Germany Peintures, collages, dessins, Musée de Grenoble, France Vera Molnar presentée par Galerie Oniris, Fiac 2001, Paris, France Entre droites et courbes, Galerie Emilia Suciu, Ettlingen, Germany reConnaître – Vera Molnar, Musée de Grenoble, France 2000 Lignes, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Au crayon, à la plume, au pinceau, à l’ordinateur, Centre d’Art Contemporain Bouvet-Ladubay, Saumur, France Computerzeichnungen, Galerie St. Johann, Saarbrücken, Germany Lettres de ma mère, Centre d’Art de Marnay-sur-Seine (CAMAC), France Oeuvres récentes, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Promenade à Ladenburg, März Galerien, Ladenburg, Germany 1999 Une visite guidée à travers mon cerveau, Espace Gustave-Fayet, Sérignan, France Inventar – Hommage zum 75. Geburtstag von Vera Molnar, März Galerien, Ladenburg, Germany Vera Molnar: Extrait de 100.000 milliards de lignes, Centre de Recherche, d‘Échange et de Diffusion pour l’Art Contemporain (CRÉDAC), Ivry-sur-Seine, France Solo d’un trait noir, Galerie Florence Arnaud, Paris, France 1998 Lettres de ma mère, Galerie Florence Arnaud, Paris, France Sensibilité numérique, Vismara Arte, Milano, Italy Sculptures, dessins, Espace de Luynes, Chevreuse, France (with Marta Pan) Vera Molnar, Manfred Mohr, Galerie Lahumière, Paris, France 1997 Peintures 1966-1996, Galerie Oniris, Rennes, France Salon Liszt: Lettres de ma mère, Institut Hongrois de Paris, France Tango, Château Bouchemaine, France 1996 Pink und Rouge, März Galerien, Mannheim and Ladenburg, Germany Tango, Musée d’Art et d’Histoire, Cholet, France 4 livrimages, École des Beaux-Arts, Valenciennes, France Oeuvres sur papier, Galerie Florence Arnaud, Paris, France Ligne, Múzeum Ernst, Budapest, Hungary Géométrie au XXème-siècle, Galerie Le Faisant, Strasbourg, France (with Friedrich Riedelsberger) 1995 De l’Esprit à l’Oeuvre, Musée d’Art et d’Histoire, Cholet, France Tableaux, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany (with François Morellet) 1994 Tableaux dessins, März Galerien, Mannheim and Ladenburg, Germany Ordres et (Dés)ordres,Wilhelm-Hack-Museum, Ludwigshafen, Germany Géometrie du Plaisir, Gesellschaft für Kunst + Gestaltung, Bonn, Germany Multiples, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany Oeuvres récentes, Galerie Quadri, Bruxelles, Belgium (with Michel Jouët) Vera Molnar. “Sommaire” 1992-93, März Galerien, Mannheim and Ladenburg, Germany 1992 Travaux anciens, Galerie St. Johann, Saarbrücken, Germany 1990 Museum für moderne Kunst, Studio A, Otterndorf, Germany Galerie St. Johann, Saarbrücken, Germany Vera Molnar. Lignes, Formes, Couleurs, Vasarely Múzeum, Budapest, Hungary Stiftung für konkrete Kunst, Reutlingen, Germany Neuf carrés, Gesellschaft für Kunst + Gestaltung, Bonn, Germany Les Gothiques, Galerie St. Charles de Rose, Paris, France 1989 Rouges, Galerie Municipale Edouard Manet, Gennevilliers, France Dialogue entre émotion et méthode II, Galerie Emilia Suciu, Karlsruhe, Germany Rouges II, Fondation Vasarely, Aix-en-Provence, France Tracés et traces, Institut Hongrois de Paris, France 1988 Dialogue entre émotion et méthode, Galerie E, Zurich, Switzerland (with Max Bill) 1984 Vera Molnar, Publishing House Lundquist, Lund, Sweden Rechteckaufbau, Galerie Circular, Bonn, Germany Creatic, Galerie du Cirques Divers, Liège, Belgium Ostinato, Galerie 30, Paris, France Studio X, Neapel, Italy 1983 Galleri Sankt Olof, Norrköping, Sweden 1981 Inclinaison – (étude préliminaire à une toile), Crédit Agricole, Caen, France Galleri Ferm, Malmö, Sweden 1979 Vera Molnar. Paris – Caen, Atelier de Recherche Esthétique à Caen, France Club der jungen Künstler, Budapest, Hungary 1977 Galleri Ferm, Malmö, Sweden 1976
Transformations Polytechnic of Central London, UK

GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2019 Automat und Mensch, Kate Vass Galerie, Zurich Alchimie des lignes, Galerie Oniris, Rennes Code&Algorithm, Hommage a Vera Molnar, Vazarely Muzeum, Budapest 2018 Dürer Cézanne Klee, Galerie Berthet-Aittouares SUMMER SPLASH 4, DAM GALLERY Berlin 2017 VERA MOLNAR – RÁKÓCZY GIZELLA – SZÍJ KAMILLA, Galerie Vintage, Budapest WRITING NEW CODES – Cordeiro / Mallary / Molnar, The Mayor Gallery, London 2016 [un]erwartet. Die Kunst des Zufalls, Kunstmuseum Stuttgart, Germany

Bartók, Muzeum Ludwig, Ludwig Museum – Museum of Contemporary Art, Budapest, Hungary

2015 AESTHETICA, DAM Gallery Berlin, Germany 2014 Rapport de Force, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France Abstraction/Figuration, Musée des Beaux arts de Rennes, France Evénement plastique, Galerie Pascal Janssens, Ghent, Belgium La Passion Dürer, Musée Jenisch, Vevey, Switzerland Vera Molnar & Torsten Ridell, aller simple, Longjumeau-Champlan, France Armory Show, New York, USA 2013 No Message Whatsoever: Frieder Nake & Friends, DAM GALLERY Berlin, Germany Beauté Rationelle, Espace Topographique de l´Art, Paris, France Dynamo, Grand Palais, Paris, France A Brief History of Line, Cenre Pompidou Metz, France 2012 Square to the Square, Galerie B55, Budapest, Hungary Chance as Strategy, Vasarely Museum, Budapest, Hungary Contemporary French Painting, Permm, Russia Das Abenteuer Konstruktivismus, Galerie Linde Hollinger, Ladeburg, Germany Osas Plus In The Vasarely Museum, Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, Hungary 2011 Think Line 2, DAM GALLERY Berlin Diversity in Unity, Galerie pascaljanssens, Ghent, Belgium cube 4x4x4, März Galerie, Mannheim, Germany 2010 On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century, Museum of Modern Art, New York Vorsicht Farbe!, Museum Ritter, Waldenburg, Germany Rencontre Le Corbusier / Vera Molnar, Stéphane Couturier, Ian Tyson, Couvent La Tourette, France 2009 elles@centrepompidou, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France 2006 Chemins Divergents, L’Arsenal, Metz, France 2005
Just a glance II, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France L’Oeil Moteur, Musée d’Art Moderne, Strasbourg, France Gris Eminents, La Maison des Arts, Carcès, France Square, Museum Ritter, Waldenbuch, Germany Nachtbilder + Neon, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany 2004 Just a glance, Galerie Cour Carrée, Paris, France Céramiques Contemporaines, Musée national de Céramique, Sèvres, France Art et Imagination Scientifique, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen, France Mesures, Musée Matisse du Cateau-Cambrésis, France Les Arts de la Terre et du Feu, La Maison de la Terre, Dieulefit, France Electrohype 2004, Malmö Konsthall, Sweden 2003 10-Dix-X, Forum Konkrete Kunst Erfurt, Germany Art Constructivise à Paris, Civico Museo di Arte Contemporanea, Calasetta, Italy Europe – Concrete – Reductive, Muzeum Architektury we Wroclawiu, Wroclaw, Poland Croissance Construite Mondriaanhuis, Museum voor Constructieve en Concrete Kunst, Amersfoort, Netherlands 2000 Art Concret, Espace de l’Art Concret, Mouans-Sarthoux, Paris, France 1999 Pocitacové Obrazy, Galerie Mêsta Blanska, Brno, Czech Republic Knifer, Molnar, Morellet, Vismara Arte, Milan, Italy 1998 Diagonal, März Galerien, Mannheim, Germany Ungarn – Avantgarde im 20. Jahrhundert, Neue Galerie der Stadt Linz, Austria Kunst im Aufbruch, Wilhelm-Hack-Museum, Ludwigshafen, Germany 1997 Tableaux, objets, sculptures, März Galerien, Ladenburg, Germany 1996 Die konkrete Zeit – Gegenstände eines Jahrhunderts, Stiftung für konkrete Kunst, Reutlingen, Germany Histoires de blanc et noir, Musée de Grenoble, France Croix – Cross – Kreuz – Chrüz, März Galerien, Ladenburg, Germany 1995 Autour du Papier, Abbaye de Bouchemaine, France Karo-Dame, Kunsthaus Aarau, Switzerland Chicago – Paris. Abstract Affinities, Ukrainian Institut of Modern Art, Chicago, Illinois 1994 Europa, Europa – Das Jahrhundert der Avantgarde in Mittel- und Osteuropa, Kunst und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn, Germany Zufall und konkrete Kunst, Haus für Konstruktive und Konkrete Kunst, Zurich, Switzerland 1993 Kunst im Herrenhof Neustadt, Germany 1992 Zufall als Prinzip Wilhelm-Hack-Museum, Ludwigshafen, Germany 1991 En Souvenir de Chernobyl Kharkov Art Museum, Kraków, Poland The European Biennal of nontradtional Graphics, Galerie Modry Pavilon, Prague, Czech Republic 1987 Art Construit, Institut Français, Stockholm, Sweden 1985 Imaginer, Construire, Bibliothèque du Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France Die Rationale, Frauenmuseum Bonn, Germany Ostinato, Galerie 30, Paris, France Studio X, Naples, Italy 1984 Electra / 83, Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France 1983 Arte Programmata e Cinetica– 1953-1963, Palazzo Reale, Milan, Italy 1981 Ars + Machina, Maison de la Culture, Rennes, France 1979 Kunst aus dem Computer, Ars Electronica/Brucknerfest 79, Linz, Austria 1978
Permutation, Transformation, Analysis, Worcester Art Museum, Massachusetts 1973 Ordinateur et Création Artistique, Sesa, Espace Cardin, Paris, France 1960 Konkrete Kunst, Helmhaus, Zurich, Switzerland