The Musée de Montmartre is honored to present, for the first time in France, a retrospective exhibition devoted to Otto and Adya van Rees, major yet still little-known figures of the 20th-century European avant-garde.
Through a chronological journey, the exhibition highlights the richness, modernity, and evolution of their work while exploring the cross-influences and fruitful artistic dialogue that shaped their creative pursuits. It also offers an opportunity to follow Otto and Adya’s life journey: that of a man and a woman who loved each other, and of two artists devoted to art, whose private lives intertwined with, inspired, and permeated their creative work—from the birth of their three children to the family tragedy that befell them. Originally from the Netherlands, where they met, Otto van Rees (1884-1957) and Adya van Rees-Dutilh (1876-1959) moved to Montmartre and settled at the Bateau-Lavoir in 1904. There, they mingled with Georges Braque, Kees van Dongen, Piet Mondrian, and Pablo Picasso, alongside whom the foundations of modernism were taking shape. Their journey reflects an open and resolutely international approach to visual art—as demonstrated by their joint role in the birth of the Dada movement in Zurich, the founding of the Cercle et Carré group in Paris, and their many travels throughout Europe. Their practice reveals a remarkable formal freedom rooted in the heart of the European avant-garde. Through around one hundred works from French, Swiss, and Dutch public and private collections—including paintings, graphic art, embroidery, sculptures, decorative arts projects, and more intimate family creations—the exhibition follows the couple’s life journey and traces the development of their respective artistic careers, from Divisionism and Cloisonnism to Cubism and the most accomplished forms of abstraction. Offering a major rediscovery of their work, which remained in the shadows for far too long, this exhibition aims to restore Otto and Adya van Rees’s bold and experimental contribution to its rightful place and highlight the role each of them played in the history of modern art.
Source: paris.fr — photo: Musée de Montmartre