EDNA ANDRADE (1917 - 2008) was an early and influential pioneer of the Hard-Edged style, Op Art, and other forms of reductivist painting. Her work prefigured that of many painters experimenting with color and optical effects across complex geometric fields, including Bridget Riley, Gabriele Evertz, and Robert Swain. She made smart use of complicated imagery, as in a series of works from the 1980s, in which she appropriated the mathematically determined patterns used to decorate Islamic architecture. Andrade once remarked that she was struck by “how little it takes to upset the eye.” With her chromatic spectrums and intricate geometric patterns, she challenges viewers to engage new and different visual logics.

Andrade was the focus of two major retrospectives during her lifetime: in 1993, at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and in 2003, at the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania. She was included in the Op Art publication by Joe Houston, Optic Nerve: Perceptual Art of the 1960s, in 2007. The artist’s work is in numerous museums throughout the U.S. including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, the Dallas Museum of Art, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and Baltimore Art Museum.

(Photo Credit: Locks Gallery; Source: Artsy + Locks Gallery)