When I think of the artworks of Sonia Delaunay I can almost believe that I had been delivered to an alternate universe where household art and museum art actually co-exist, having equal relevance, rather than separated into exclusive camps. As a painter of the modern life Delaunay was mesmerized by the effects of incandescent lighting, especially the electric spheres or miniature suns that lit the trendy Parisian venues she often visited like the Bal Bullier dance hall, and Magic City. the electric lights became abstracted interior circles, dividing white light into its component colors, rather like a crude version of Chevreul’s color wheels, where complementary colors opposed one another.
Nothing is regular in her exploration; rather it is instinctive and even haphazard except for her use of simultaneous color contrasts which was meant to mimic the musicality of the spoken word and as a result we get simultaneity in pieces but never in the whole. She was however, acutely aware of limits to the simultaneous and she delighted in making paintings that were impossible to take in one sitting. This daydream painting of virtual music can never really control the content of a mind in turmoil, though it is surely influenced by it.
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