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The exhibition
The Musée d'arts de Nantes and the Buffalo AKG Art Museum (USA), with a rich collection of modern and contemporary art in which abstraction plays a major role, are presenting a groundbreaking exhibition exploring the historical, theoretical and formal links between optical art and video and computer art, from the 1960s to the present day.
In the 1960s, optical art spread widely in the arts and popular culture, driven by artists such as Victor Vasarely, Yaacov Agam and Jesús Rafael Soto. Placing the visitor's experience of the works at the heart of their concerns, Op art artists played with optical effects to deceive the public's perception.
The rise of information and communication technologies fascinated optical artists. At the same time, computer engineers understood the artistic potential of their work tools. Everyone experimented and explored the creative capacities of the new tools and languages. The result: programmed repetition, binarity, pixels and moirés became motifs with which artists are still composing today.With over 80 paintings, computer-generated drawings, sculptures, videos and digital installations, this exhibition reveals how optical art and new media influence each other, from the pioneers of the 1960s to more contemporary digital artists.
LE LABO: It's your turn!
There's nothing like experimentation for a better understanding! The museum has imagined a space at the heart of the exhibition, where young and old alike can come and go to test the programmed creation, optical games and digital principles put into action by the artists in the exhibition.
Le Labo is a space where you can see, understand and touch without moderation!An exhibition divided into five sections
1- Introduction: Op art and kinetic art
The selected works demonstrate these artists' early interest in the innovations of their time (optical research, new materials), as well as their historical and aesthetic concomitance with the beginnings of video art.
2- Programmed repeat
This section highlights repetition as a creative process in optical works. These works are the result of a predefined program.
3- Binarity
This section explores the aesthetic effects of binarity, combining optical black & white and computer black & white, from early computer-modelled images and plotter prints, to the lines of code worked by digital artists such as Ryoji Ikeda.
4- 3D
This section examines the historical and formal links between optical art and new media art, through the dual lens of human depth perception and 3D modeling. By making human binocular vision its privileged subject, optical art very early on questioned our optical and cerebral faculties.
Today, the optical game persists among many digital artists practicing 3D animation.
5 - Pixel
The digital image is, in fact, the compressed reproduction of an image, summarized in a multitude of colored points of light (pixels), enabling its distribution. The pixelated orthonormal grid has become, and remains, an infinite playground for many artists.
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In photos
View of the Electric Op exhibition presented from April 4 to August 31, 2025.... 
View of the Electric Op exhibition presented from April 4 to August 31, 2025.... 
View of the Electric Op exhibition presented from April 4 to August 31, 2025.... 
View of the Electric Op exhibition presented from April 4 to August 31, 2025.... 
View of the Electric Op exhibition presented from April 4 to August 31, 2025.... 
View of the Electric Op exhibition presented from April 4 to August 31, 2025.... -
On video
At the heart of the exhibition with Salomé Van Eynde
Exhibition curator Salomé van Eynde presents Electric Op: from optical to digital art.
Salomé Van Eynde, exhibition curator. Micro sidewalks
At the heart of the exhibition, we gathered the impressions of visitors. Geek, art lover or family, they all have something to say!
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Catalog and books about the exhibition
Bilingual English/French catalog for the exhibition Electric Op: From Optical to Digital Art, presented at the Musée d'arts de Nantes from April 4 to August 31, 2025.
Available for consultation at the museum library, and on sale at the museum bookshop-boutique.
Books selected by the museum library
Here is a selection of books about the exhibition Electric Op. From optical to digital art. You can consult them at the library by appointment.
Exhibition curator: Tina Rivers Ryan, editor-in-chief of Artforum, former curator of the Buffalo AKG Art Museum.
Exhibition curator in Nantes: Salomé Van Eynde, Exhibition Manager, Musée d'arts de Nantes
Electric Op. From Optical to Digital Art is an exhibition co-organized by the Buffalo AKG Art Museum and the Musée d'arts de Nantes. It runs at the Buffalo AKG Art Museum from September 27, 2024 to February 3, 2025.
The exhibition is supported by FRench American Museum Exchange (FRAME), to whom the museum extends its warmest thanks.
The Musée d'arts de Nantes would like to thank its patron Banque Palatine for its financial support of the exhibition, and the Fonds Métropolitain pour la Culture.
The museum extends its warmest thanks to its media partners, whose support plays an active part in helping the public to discover the exhibition and to visit it.
Artists : Yoshiyuki Abe, Yaacov Agam, Josef Albers, Cory Arcangel, Stephen Beck, Charles Bézie, Computer Technique Group, Martha Boto, Angela Bulloch, Bernard Caillaud, Nicolas Chardon, Analivia Cordeiro, Douglas Coupland, Larry Cuba, Hans Dehlinger, Jean-François Dubreuil, Karl Gerstner, Aldo Giorgini, Peter Halley, Frederick Hammersley, Jean-Pierre Hébert, Gary Hill, Hervé Huitric & Monique Nahas, Ryoji Ikeda, JODI, LIA, LoVid, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Hiroshi Kawano, William J. Kolomyjec, Leroy Lamis, Julio Le Parc, Eduardo Mac Entyre, Heinz Mack, Jean-Claude Marquette, Vera Molnár, Manfred Mohr, François Morellet, Rhea Myers, Frieder Nake, Georg Nees, Aurélie Nemours, A. Michael Noll, Casey Reas, Oscar Reutersvärd, Bridget Riley, Kristen Roos, Rafaël Rozendaal, Nicolas Schöffer, Lillian F. Schwartz, Michel Seuphor, Francisco Sobrino, Jesús Rafael Soto, Laura Splan, Jen Stark, Lloyd Sumner, Zdeněk Sýkora, Luis Tomasello, Stan Vanderbeek, Livinus and Jeep van de Bundt, Victor Vasarely , Steina and Woody Vasulka, Leo Villareal , Gerhard von Graevenitz, Marius Watz , John Whitney, Yvaral, Edward Zajec, Anton Zöttl
Caption and credits
François Morellet, Répartition aléatoire de 20% de carrés, superposée 5 fois en pivotant au center, 1970. Nantes, Musée d'arts de Nantes © Musée d'arts de Nantes, photo. C. Clos © Adagp, Paris, 2025
Leo Villareal, Red Life, 1999. Buffalo AKG Art Museum. Gift of Zoë and Joel Dictrow, 2007 © Leo Villareal. Photo: Brenda Bieger, Buffalo AKG Art Museum