Wojciech Fangor, the Polish pioneer of Op art, died on 25 October, aged 92.
The outbreak of the Second World War meant that Fangor, born in Warsaw in 1922, had to study art privately. He received a diploma in absentia from Warsaw’s Academy of Fine Arts in 1946, where he later served as an assistant professor from 1953 to 1961.
When Stalin’s death in 1953 opened up Poland’s cultural policies, Fangor gave up Socialist Realism and became a founding member of the Polish Poster School.
In 1961, Fangor left Poland, living in West Berlin and England before settling in the US in 1966. He taught at the Farleigh Dickinson University, New Jersey, and at Harvard University. The Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York, staged a solo exhibition of his work in 1970.
Fangor returned to Poland in 1999, which, according to the auctioneer and curator Simon de Pury, had a negative impact on his career. “If he had stayed in the US he would have a much higher profile today,” De Pury told the Financial Times. De Pury’s exhibition space in Mayfair, central London, opened in December 2014 with an exhibition of Fangor’s works.
Fangor, best known for his circular abstract paintings, is one of Poland’s most highly regarded artists. At last week’s Frieze Masters fair in London, Mayor Gallery reportedly sold four pieces by the artist priced at $300,000 each.