Moholy-Nagy, Laszlo (1895–1946)

Hungarian-born painter, sculptor and photographer. Inspired by constructivism, he made abstract sculptures from the early 1920s, and from 1923 to 1929 taught at the Bauhaus school in Weimar and later in the USA. He experimented with a wide range of media, materials, and techniques, including the use of photographic techniques to achieve non-naturalistic effects.

He worked in Paris, London and Amsterdam as well as in Germany, and in 1937 moved to the USA, where he spent the rest of his life. His commitment to innovation is reflected in the range of his works: in the books Painting, Photography, Film 1925 and The New Vision 1929; in his documentary film Berlin Still Life 1926; and in and his experiments with kinetic sculpture during the 1920s, and with what he called ‘space modulators’ – sculptures made of plexiglas and other materials – during the 1930s. An important teacher and theoretician, he had a great influence on 20th-century art and design.