A radical vision of abstraction pulses- Harmony and Dissonance: Orphism in Paris, 1910-1930,

Orphism in Paris, 1910-1930, is an exhibition that charts Orphism’s expansive reach across disciplines—where color is movement, rhythm is form, and painting becomes a visual symphony. Taking over the Guggenheim’s spiraling rotunda, the show presents over 90 works that reframe Orphism’s position within the broader avant-garde, not merely as an art movement but as a fluid dialogue between painting, dance, music, and poetry.

Named after Orpheus, the mythical poet and musician whose melodies could bridge worlds, Orphism was born in the early 1910s amidst an era of seismic cultural and technological shifts. The movement’s pioneers—Robert and Sonia Delaunay, František Kupka, and others—sought to break from the constraints of representation, constructing compositions where color and form existed in a state of perpetual motion. The exhibition underscores how Orphism resonated beyond the visual arts, drawing inspiration from contemporary dance and the rhythmic structures of modern music. In these paintings, motion is not merely suggested but enacted—planes of color pulsate, shapes spiral, compositions unfold like musical scores translated into pigment.

Beyond its dynamic forms, Orphism was a reaction to the accelerating tempo of modernity. In the streets of early 20th-century Paris, electric lights flickered, automobiles blurred past, and cinema redefined perception. Orphism absorbed this sensory overload, translating speed and simultaneity into luminous compositions that transcended time and space. The Delaunays, in particular, championed a vision of “pure painting”—a universal visual language that rejected narrative in favor of sensation.

Revisiting Orphism from a contemporary lens, Harmony and Dissonance situates the movement within a lineage of abstraction that remains vital today. Works previously exhibited in Synchromism (1978) at the Whitney Museum and Robert et Sonia Delaunay (2003) at the Centre Pompidou return here, not as historical artifacts but as dynamic forces, still vibrating with the energy of their creation. This is an exhibition not just of paintings but of movement, sound, and the restless pursuit of a new artistic syntax—one where harmony and dissonance are not opposites, but echoes of the same rhythm.