Tate Modern to celebrate avantgarde artist in exhibition in July

An exhibition celebrating the work of one of the most innovative artists of the 20th century avant-garde movement is to open at the Tate Modern in July.

Sophie Taeuber-Arp is one of the most prominent artists and designers of the 1920s and 1930s, dismantling borders between abstract, design and craft.

The Tate Modern exhibition is a long overdue recognition of the artist’s pivotal contributions to modern art and design, and will be the first in the U.K. to trace her career as a painter, architect, teacher, writer, and designer.

It will also show how she trailblazed a new path for the development of abstraction.

Born in 1889, Sophie Taeuber-Arp studied Fine and Applied Art in Munich and began her career in Zurich, at the time an international hub for the avant-garde movement during the First World War.

She became a successful textile practitioner and teacher while experimenting with non- figurative art.

Creating vivid work on paper and embroideries, her work stood apart from her contemporaries’ abstract art and bypassed deconstruction of the figurative form.

A selection of her beaded bags, rugs, jewellery, and pillowcases will be shown.

In 1915, she met her husband Jean Arp and it was during this time she became associated with the Dada movement the short-lived but influential movement that sought to integrate art and life, embracing the abstract and the absurd.

Indeed, her Dada-heads are some of the most iconic of the era.

She also created marionettes for the avant-garde interpretation of the play ‘King Stag’ and all of the original marionettes will be on display at the Tate Modern.

The exhibition will also include designs and furniture from the 1920s, where she experimented with architecture and interior design.

Her commercial success of her architectural practice enabled Taeuber-Arp to design her own studio-house near Paris, which would become a focal point for intellectuals such as Tristan Tzara, Max Ernst and James Joyce.

Following the outbreak of the Second World War, Taueber-Arp turned to what little means of artistic expression the displaced artist had left – drawing.

The final room of the exhibition will display the works she made in exile before her tragic accidental death from carbon-monoxide poisoning aged 53 in 1943.

These works embody her lifelong interest in abstraction, constant development of new ideas and ability to embrace new materials and methods in a way that continues to influence artists today.

The exhibition will also bring together over 200 objects from collections across America and Europe and a small introductory book with an overview of her life and work will also be available.

Online ticket bookings will open shortly before the 17 May, when the museum is due to officially re-open.

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Main Pic: The King Stag