Sonia Delaunay

Odessa resident, artist, fashion designer

The life of the artist's family was quite tragic. The brother died in the Soviet prison in Solovki after
fifteen years of imprisonment. In recent years, the mother lived without food, despite the money
she received from her children. The house Sonia inherited from her relatives in St. Petersburg was
nationalized

Almost a hundred years ago, the cover of Vogue looked like the picture, and was
also associated with Ukraine. Although she remained known only to a narrow
circle of fashion fans.
Its author is the world-famous Odesa resident of Jewish origin, Sonia
Terk-Delaunay (Sara Elivna Stern). In 1908, Sonya moved to Paris, where she
actively studied, visited museums and married the French artist Robert Delaunay.
In Wikipedia, which is not surprising, you can read that she was a subject of the
Russian Empire, in many sources she is noted as a Russian artist. Of course,
they could not miss such a name.
However, Sonya herself wrote: "I love the clean, bright colors of my childhood,
Ukraine. I remember the peasant weddings of my country, where red and green
dresses, decorated with numerous bows, flew in the dance. I remember how
watermelons and melons grow: tomatoes gird the houses with red, and large
sunflowers - yellow with a black core - shine in the light, very high blue sky."
She was born in the city of Odesa on November 14, 1885 in the family of the manager of the nail factory Elia (Ilya)
Yosypovich Stern and Hana Tovelivna Terk, a native of Odesa. Even while studying at the gymnasium in St. Petersburg,
Sonya Terk was distinguished by a sharp analytical mind. Although her parents saw her as a mathematician, her drawing
teacher noticed her unusual perception of the world around her and her knack for drawing and arranged for Sonya to study
at an art school. At first, she studied in Germany, at the Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe. Then, at the age of 20, she left
for Europe and settled in Paris in 1907. He studies in studios, joins the circle of radical French youth, gets to know
collectors. Studied at La Palette Academy (teachers included A. Ozanfan and A. Dunois de Segonzac). Despite the high
status of the institution, Sonya was dissatisfied with the teaching, considered his "mood" too critical. Therefore, she spent
more time not in the academy, but in galleries around Paris.

Together with her husband, Sonia became the founder of the

abstract pictorial direction of "simultaneism" or "orphism", which
consisted in creating movement effects arising from the
juxtaposition of color spots.
While Robert experimented with abstract painting in search of
himself, Sonia, in order to feed her family, during the First World
War and after it, engaged in applied creativity, in particular, clothing
design based on simultanism.
At first, she created outfits for herself and her friends. Subsequently,
in 1918, she opened the interior fashion store Casa Sonia in
Madrid, which quickly gained popularity among the aristocracy and
received branches in Bilbao, Barcelona, and San Sebastian.
In 1920, Sonia opened her own fashion atelier in Paris. An incredible sense of color, design talent and outfits she created
for celebrities made Sonia Delaunay a star in the world of fashion at that time.
She dressed Hollywood actress Gloria Swenson, writer Nancy Cunard, architect Erne Goldfinger. The demand for her
fabrics was huge. Her own workshop, which was engaged in printing on fabric, distributed its products not only in France,
but also in other European countries and in the USA.
At the Paris Exhibition of Decorative Arts
in 1925, the artist presented a wide range
of products, from "simultaneous" scarves
to carpets and cars.
The plasticity, rhythmicity of forms, lines
and silhouettes, the variegated colors of
Sonia Delaunay's fabrics bring us back to
her memories of Ukraine, its picturesque
landscapes and images.
It was after this exhibition that the
magazine "Vogue" placed the so-called
"optical" (with characteristic optical
effects) dress of the artist on the cover.
It was the time of women's emancipation.
The model is shown here against the
background of a "simultaneous" Citroen.
Numerous theaters and studios
bombarded her with proposals for
collaboration, the Sorbonne University
invited her to give lectures on art history.
Sonia Delaunay became the first female artist in history to have the honor of opening a personal exhibition
at the Louvre. This exhibition took place during the artist's lifetime, in 1964, and included 117 works that
she personally selected and donated to the museum. The house Sonia inherited from her relatives in St.
Petersburg was nationalized. However, her talent inspires designers to this day, and we have no right to
forget about it.

At almost all exhibitions of abstract art in

post-war Europe, Delaunay exhibits her work
and that of her husband. In 1963, he donated
117 of his own works and those of his husband
to France. A year later, the presentation of this
huge gift takes place in the Louvre (Delaunay
became the first woman artist whose
retrospective exhibition took place in the Louvre
during her lifetime). In 1975, she was awarded
France's highest award, the Legion of Honor.
Even at the age of 93, Delaunay was an
extremely lively, democratic, accessible
interlocutor, a mentor to young people. She was
also a Knight of Arts and Letters.

Sonia Delaunay died at the age of 94 in Paris.