Vera MOLNAR: The line has no end

"A line, like a curriculum vitae, reflecting all my past activities: the sum of my life" (Vera Molnar, November 6, 1997)

The theme of the line has been a recurring topic in all of Vera Molnar's work for over seventy years. The exhibition "The line has no end (Un ligne n'a pas de fin)" at the Oniris gallery brings together recent works and older ones, all previously unseen in the two gallery exhibition spaces.

Constructive, her work is however in many ways. The artist elaborates purely visual systems. The simple plastic elements, the line, the square are declined there according to the principle of the variation. Looking at the aesthetics, she says her attachment to the theory of the Gestalt: each of her pieces questions the moment when the construction becomes form.

Vera Molnar is the inventor of a practice of the series that makes her a precursor of minimalism. The artist calls her programs "rules of the game". For example, she explores the possibilities of variations of two parallels in a square frame, in a tireless search for the missing piece. From the 1960s, the computer became a privileged ally of the artist's "imaginary machine": it shows, at a glance, the extent of the possibilities. "Thanks to the computer, one approaches oneself", she says, one finds more quickly the form which one likes.

The dimension of chance intervenes then. Once the pictorial principle is established, the computer indicates a multitude of constellations that she did not expect and the drawing, often taken by hand, freely chooses its line. The minute variations go as far as the disorder, the trembling. The color is another factor of modification of the form.

The artist refers to his works as perpetual "repentances", attempts that are repeated every day. For one should also repent of making abstracts, she adds with an amused air.

also at the Museum of Fine Arts in Rennes

From October 9, 2021 to January 2, 2022, Vera Molnar presents another major exhibition entitled " Not cold to the eyes " (Pas froid aux yeux) at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rennes. This solo exhibition follows the one presented at the Espace de l'Art Concret in Mouans-Sartoux on the French Riviera, which was presented throughout the summer of 2021 and of which the Oniris gallery was a privileged partner.