István NÁDLER (né en 1938)Untitled No.2, 2009Peinture tempera sur toileSignée, titrée et datée au dosCasein tempera on canvas; signed, titled and dated on the reverse140 x 120 cm - 55 1/8 x 47 1/4 in."The œuvre of István Nádler may be described as the search for an imaginary form that encapsulates the world. Nádler has always explored the delicate balance between diametric opposites, seeking perspectives and constellations in which apparently mutually exclusive properties interweave and dissolve into one another: universal and concrete, spiritual and sensual, personal and impersonal, open and closed, abstract and objective, geometric and expressive, form and gesture, plane and space, up and down, out and in, visible and invisible, material and immaterial.Among the pairs of opposites, the conflict between form and gesture is probably the most emphatic: Nádler's entire life's work is defined by the alternation and dialogue between geometric and expressive forms. His starting point is often a closed geometric form, rendered dynamic by the human gestures written in and over it. The internal happenings of his œuvre can be described as variations in the relationship between forms and gestures. Relationships are what Nádler depicts, not only in a formal sense, but also in a human and even a spiritual sense. The subjects of his works are often human feelings and human relations. His pictures - and their titles - frequently feature literary, biblical and art historical references, although the compositions themselves never become strictly narrative, and what they are about, above all, is their own story, the path of the forms, gestures and motifs, and their variants." David Fehér, art historian"16000