Simon Hantaï

Simon Hantaï (7 December 1922, Biatorbágy, Hungary – Paris, 12 September 2008;[1] took French nationality in 1966) is a painter generally associated with abstract art.

After studying at the Budapest School of Fine Art, he traveled through Italy on foot and moved to France in 1948.

A Simon Hantaï Retrospective opened at the Centre Pompidou on May 22, 2013, with more than 130 works from 1949 to 1990s, and a full color illustrated catalog.

Hantaï began creating pliage paintings in 1960, conceiving of the process as a marriage between Surrealist automatism and the allover gestures of Abstract Expressionism.

Hantaï stated: "It was while working on the Studies that I realized what my true subject was – the resurgence of the ground underneath my painting.