Tamara de Lempicka exhibition in Seoul

Tamara de Lempicka

Tamara de Lempicka (May 16, 1898 – March 18, 1980), born as Maria Gorska in Warsaw, Poland, was a Polish Art Deco painter. As an ‘Art Deco’ artist, Lempicka reformed the portrait style, more specifically, the role of subject as a liberated and independent woman. Her work is difficult to classify and features elements of traditional Art Deco such as the nude female body but also Cubism (An art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture) and other stylistic movements of the early 20th century.

Lempicka got introduced to art at the age of 12, when her mother had paid for an established painter to create her daughter’s portrait. Unsatisfied with the results and convinced that she could do better herself, Lempicka set out on a task that would afterwards carve out a successful, if tumultuous career. She got married young and gave birth to her only child a daughter named Kizette while living in St. Petersburg. Forced to leave the city as a refugee during the Soviet Revolution, she fled to Paris through financial necessity and learned to paint, exhibit and sell her works.

The Sleeper (La Dourmese)

Tamara Lempicka exhibition is scheduled at The Seoul Arts Center in South Korea, until March 5th 2017. This new exhibition presents Lempickas works in a thematic route that will allow the public to learn about new aspects of her art. The works of this “queen of Art Deco,” who is also noted as “the first woman artist to be a glamour star” and “the baroness with a brush,” have traveled for the first time to Korea after receiving much attention in previous exhibitions around the world. Lempicka’s portraits of strong, sexually empowered women and her neat, as well as colorful and daring methods of painting showcases are definitely a must see.

To conclude this article here is a quote from Lempicka:
“Among a hundred paintings, you could recognize mine,
my goal was:
Do not copy. Create a new style, …
colors light and bright,
return to elegance in my models.”

Amiira Ismail – The AsiaN  Media Intern