Tekers-MC 1981

Here's Victor Vasarely's painting, "Tekers-MC", created sometime in the twentieth century. Look at how the geometric shapes seem to swim before your eyes. I can imagine Vasarely, with his black marker pen, carefully mapping out the design of concentric circles, squares, and triangles. One wrong move of the hand and the whole thing is ruined. There is a tight control here, a concern for perfect accuracy. But somehow, within those constraints, he found a way to make a painting that feels fluid and alive. Vasarely would have mixed his colours carefully to achieve just the right effect. The colours sing out – red, green, and blue – creating a striking optical illusion. And that feeling of movement might remind you of Bridget Riley, another artist interested in perception. Artists are always riffing on one another. Ultimately, this kind of painting is about feeling, about letting the artwork speak to you and move you, even if you don't quite know why.