Geometric shards and sweeping streaks in chromatic hues adorn The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum’s walls. Upon first glance, the artworks feature no discernible subject for interpretation. Yet viewers walking around the museum’s iconic rotunda are brought along a journey of education and appreciation of Orphism, a largely unknown style of colorful abstract art, coined in 1912 by the French poet Guillaume Apollinaire.
Orphism thrives through its creation of mystic suspense — some artworks contain themes that are more easily recognizable, while others are completely abstract. Taking center stage is color itself, and there is no end to the wealth of the style’s influences — nighttime city scenes, animated jazz and tango, and scientific studies of kinesthetic motion and vision. “Harmony and Dissonance” guides viewers from painting to painting, drawing them closer to the abstract art form.
“Edtaonisl (Ecclesiastic),” a painting by Francis Picabia, spotlights the movement of a dancer practicing with her troupe aboard a ship. Shattered and recombined, the variegated form of the dancer is concealed in ambiguous geometry, alluding to the body’s swirling motion and the rocking ship. Gold, charcoal, violet and deep blue tones evoke glamorous and metropolitan imagery, inspired by the French artist’s visit to New York City after the ship docked. Piacabia’s skillful splintering of forms and overlaying gradients transform the jumble of shapes into an enchanting rhapsodic performance. Viewers can reflect on the bustling cultural milieu of the ship within the context of a grander, increasingly connected 20th-century world.
“Localization of Graphic Motifs II” by František Kupka synthesizes science with art. The piece illustrates optical energy — the energy of light — drawing inspiration from physics, biology, early film and color theory. The piece demonstrates depth with iridescent flashes of magenta, emerald, cobalt and carmine against more muted black and gray. Kupka expresses these intersecting colors as surging whirlpools, stemming from a central focal point and spiraling outward in all directions. Characteristically Orphic through its abstract form, the painting transforms scientific influence into a complex visual eccentricity. This piece is a prime example of the many inspirations that artists can pull from when creating Orphic paintings, such as cityscapes and science.
Jointly striking are a trio of Eiffel Tower paintings, some of the most easily identifiable subjects on display. “Eiffel Tower (Tour Eiffel)” and “Red Eiffel Tower (La Tour rouge)” were painted by Robert Delaunay, one of Orphism’s pioneers. The former employs mild tones of rust and bronze against a smoky gray sky, while the latter contrasts vivid scarlet beams against a cloudy blue backdrop. Both pieces disjoint the building, fracturing linear metal architecture into discordant shards. The third Eiffel Tower painting, Marc Chagall’s “The Big Wheel (La grande roue),” presents Paris’ skyline and a Ferris wheel in beaming yellow. The tower is distant and mellowed in pastoral green. Chagall’s tower captures the movement of the Ferris wheel’s carts with blurred brush strokes. With all three towers in the same section, a viewer can create artistic comparisons, understanding how the same subject can evoke a range of emotions based on emphasis, color and mood.
“Harmony and Dissonance” left me enthralled. Orphism is preoccupied with visualizing the abstract, requiring viewers to possess some contextual understanding of the fast-paced culture, innovation and industry of the 20th century. These ideas are expressed through artists’ use of color theory, creating saturated fragments and halos that give life to their playful exploration of motion. Each work weaves improvisation into visuals of pulsing, radiant reconfigurations. The exhibition is a synesthetic experience as the viewer tries to make sense of the abstract and challenges them to move away from the tangible.
“Harmony and Dissonance: Orphism in Paris, 1910–1930” is on view at The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum until March 9, 2025.
Contact Sydney Chan at [email protected].