Artworks

GYÖRGY KEPES (Hungarian, 1906 - 2001)

György Kepes (Hungarian: [ˈkɛpɛʒ ˈɟørɟ]; October 4, 1906 – December 29, 2001) was a Hungarian-born painter, photographer, designer, educator, and art theorist, best known for his mixed media approach to painting and photography.

Kepes spent the entirety of his adult life creating, studying, and teaching art subjects worldwide. From the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Budapest to the Illinois Institute of Design in Chicago, Kepes worked in design, film, theory, painting, architecture, technology, and more. While finishing his masters in visual studies at MIT, Kepes demonstrated a particular interest in images produced with technology such as x-ray machines and microscopes. This interest translated into Kepes’ most famous works: his media depictions of plants and organisms, with which he used both painting and photography to create surrealist scientific-inspired imagery. Kepes worked as a professor at the Illinois Institute of Design in Chicago and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology until his retirement in 1974. Today, Kepes’ work can be found at several institutions including The Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Tate Gallery in London.