Robert Delaunay (12 April 1885, Paris – 25 October 1941) was a French

artist who used Orphism, which is similar to abstract art, abstraction and cubism
in his work. Delaunay concentrated on Orphism, while his later works were more
abstract, reminiscent of Paul Klee. His key influence related to bold use of color,
and a clear love of experimentation of both depth and tone. Hid colors are very
inspired by Fauvism. He expressed objects through color, movement, and
expression rather than form. While he was a child, Delaunay's parents divorced,
and he was raised by his uncle, in La Ronchère (near Bourges). He took up
painting at an early age and, by 1903, he was producing mature imagery in a
confident, impressionistic style.

In 1908, after a term in the military working as a regimental librarian, he

met Sonia Terk, who he later married, though at the time she was married to a
German art dealer who she would soon divorce. In 1909, Delaunay began to
paint a series of studies of the city of Paris and the Eiffel Tower. The following
year, he married Terk, and the couple settled in a studio apartment in Paris,
where they later had a son. At the invitation of Wassily Kandinsky, Delaunay
joined The Blue Rider (Der Blaue Reiter), a Munich-based group of abstract
artists, in 1911, and his art took a turn for the abstract.

In “Rhythm, Joie de Vivre,” innovative French artist Robert Delaunay

painted complementary colors opposite each other to convey life’s pleasures and
difficulties. A set designer who later utilized Cubist theories to explore contrasting
colors, Delaunay (1885 – 1941) began exhibiting only a year after he started
painting. His ingenious style of Orphism expressed an object’s movement, light
and rhythm, rather than its form. Delaunay's work also incorporated many
experimental mediums, and inspired the emergence of abstract art in the 1920s.
-WAS A FRENCH ORPHIST
ORPHISM: SUBDIVISION OF CUBISM THAT USED BRIGHT COLORS AND
MORE ABSTRACTION
- BOLD USE OF COLOR AND MORE DEPTH OF TONE
- HE BEGAN TO USE FAUVIST COLORS TO CHANGE CUBISM
- USED AN OBJECTS MOVEMENT, LIGHT, AND RHYTHM INSTEAD OF
ITS FORM
LIFE:
- BEGAN PAINTING AT AN EARLY AGE
- MET WIFE, SONIA TERK AFTER A TERM IN THE MILITARY
- BORN APRIL 12, 1885 IN PARIS RAISED BY UNCLE
- INCORPORATED ABSTRACTISM IN HIS ART AFTER JOINING GROUP
OF ABSTRACT ARTISTS
- DIED OF CANCER 25 OCTOBER, 1941

-Tall Portuguese Woman

-Simultaneous Contrasts: Sun and Moon
-The Red Tower
- Rhythm, Joie de Vivre