Sonia Delaunay

Sonia Delaunay (1885 1979) is one of the most important female artists of the early twentieth century, whose contribution to the European avant-garde was fundamental. Russian-born, she moved to Paris in 1906 where she studied at the Académie de la Palette. Her early work was infl uenced by the bold Fauvist paintings of Matisse, Gauguin and Van Gogh among others. Shifting her interest to abstraction, she celebrated the modern world and urban life, exploring ideas of colour theory together with her husband Robert Delaunay. She also collaborated with artists and poets such as Guillaume Apollinaire and Blaise Cendrars with whom she created the acclaimed book Prose on the Transsiberian Railway and of Little Jehanne of France. After spending time in Spain and Portugal during the First World War.