Jean Varda: The Renaissance Man
The First SF Museum Show in 70 Years
August 10 – October 31, 2024
Opening Reception Saturday, August 10th, 2–5pm
The Beat Museum is pleased to present a special exhibition of major artworks and drawings by artist Jean “Yanco” Varda (1893–1971), provided courtesy of the John Natsoulas Gallery. An enduring cultural icon, Varda’s art remains a testament to a man with an unparalleled joie de vive.
Born in Smyrna (then the Ottoman Empire) of Greek and French parentage, Varda was a child prodigy, developing skill as a painter at a young age, and earning commissions painting portraits in Athens, where he spent his teen years. By 19 he was living in Paris, where he met Picasso and Braque. As Varda tells it, it was at Picasso’s suggestion that he abandoned his youthful portrait style, moving toward Cubist mosaics, and he developed a technique using shards of mirror, scratched and colored from the backside to show through the front.
Word of his escapades around the world, along with Varda’s uniquely enthralling personality, brought numerous luminaries of the Cubist, Dada, and Surrealist movements into his orbit in Paris, and the Bloomsbury Group in London. He first came to America (New York) in 1939, and visited San Francisco. The following year he moved to Anderson Creek in Big Sur, and after meeting Henry Miller, Varda assisted him in moving there as well. He also became close friends with Anaïs Nin, and appears as a character in her novel, Collages. After spending the summer of 1946 teaching art at Black Mountain College, he returned to San Francisco to teach at the California School of Fine Arts (San Francisco Art Institute).
Varda’s best known residence was aboard the SS Vallejo, part of a community of houseboats moored at the Sausalito marina, which he later shared with Alan Watts. Varda turned the Vallejo into a floating salon, where he regaled guests from all walks with stories of his fabled life over dinners and raucous costume parties that have since become mythical in reputation. Wrote Anaïs Nin, “Varda is the only artist I know leading a free life today.”
The Beat Museum is thrilled to host the first museum exhibition of Jean Varda’s art in San Francisco in 70 years. The work on display offers visitors a glimpse into Varda’s entirely unique working styles, including his innovative mirror-mosaics and multi-layered textile collages.
Join us for an opening reception on Saturday, August 10th from 2–5pm. A new book by John Natsoulas Gallery Press will accompany the exhibition, and will be available in hardcover and softcover.