Stanislaus OSTOJA-KOTKOWSKI

Polish; Australian 1922–94

The term Op Art was first coined in the mid 1960s to describe the exciting new style of art that had emerged in America and Europe which exploited optical phenomena to create dazzling images that flickered and vibrated. Before long, optical pattern and brilliant colour, often disorientating in their combined effect, became the pervasive style in contemporary fashion, advertising and interior design.

In Australia Polish-born Stan Ostoja-Kotkowski was one of the leading exponents of the style. While no doubt aware of and influenced by international developments in contemporary art, his ‘immersion in op art [came] out of experiments of light manipulation, projection and refraction, and the retinal effect of after-image’.1 Ostoja-Kotkowski believed that artists should utilise the technology of their own time and, in addition to creating abstract works in fired vitreous enamel and, later, meticulously crafted optical images such as The planet, 1966, he was a pioneer in experimental art projects that incorporated projected light, laser optics and audio-visual technology.

The subject matter of The planet reflects the interest that many artists working during the 1960s had in the power of the natural world and humanity’s place within the cosmos. Its simple graphic forms, composed of fine strips of coloured adhesive paper against a red-painted background, also come out of the hard-edge colour-field style of painting that was popular at the time. The saturated contrasting colours and linear structure of The planet results in the ‘explosion of the nerve-endings and visual disturbance’ so characteristic of Op Art, while the almost fluorescent yellows and oranges glow, introducing the additional element of light into the composition.

1 J. Phipps, I Had a Dream: Australian Art in the 1960s (exh. cat.), National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 1997, p. 52.

Kirsty M. Grant