Shapes are uncertain, palette is bright. Abstract human figures in unexpected patterns and color mismatch forms. Ready to teleport?

I’m talking about Paris of the early 20th-century and Orphism avant-garde art-movement. Creations of the most interesting cultural time period currently on view at The Guggenheim.

L-R: Marcel Duchamp’ painting, Guggenheim library museum entrance + a frame from “library scene” in Interstellar movie. Digital Collage by Alëna Adamson.

It all started with "Sad Young Man on a Train" for me. They hanged this Marcel’s Duchamp painting next to the library entrance. The deconstructed art phenomena and its warm colors reminded me of rustling yellow book pages. Looking at the canvas from afar, I clearly imagined my favorite “Landing in the Tesseract” scene from C. Nolan’s “Interstellar”. In my mind, it was located in the round Guggenheim wall hole aka library entrance.

Art Portal is now open. Welcome to Harmony and Dissonance: Orphism in Paris, 1910-1930.

Orphism as an “enhanced cubism” art-movement was created by a poet and art critic Guillaume Apollinaire. It first appeared in 1913 - very important year in the historical sense. “The Year Before the Storm”. There’s a whole book by Florian Illies about it. Magic of everything happening at once in Europe on the threshold of the first world wars. Paintings are hypnotizing and alive. The style is associated, mainly, with Robert Delaunay and his wife Sonia, whose grandiose canvas above invites you to spy on Parisian party goers. And for her husband Robert Delaunay - I just love how he deconstructs Eiffel Tower.