Leonardo da Vinci - Sketch of a flying machine
Leonardo da Vinci: the dreamer of possibilities
During the Renaissance, Leonardo da Vinci did not separate art from science: every natural observation, every reflection of water or flight of a bird fed his imagination and his inventions. His notebooks, filled with sketches of automatons, movable bridges and helicopters, show a mind capable of projecting the future into the present . Each painting was not merely aesthetic: it was a scientific experiment , a laboratory of perception, light and movement. Leonardo embodied the idea that curiosity, combined with rigor, can produce new worlds.
Kazimir Malevich - The Knife Grinder (1912-1913)
Kazimir Malevich: Abstraction that liberates the soul
At the beginning of the 20th century, Malevich introduced radical abstraction with his White Square on a White Background . He no longer sought to represent the visible world, but to reveal the essence of perception . The canvas becomes a space for meditation, silence and contemplation: the viewer is confronted with himself, with his own sensitivity. In an era marked by the industrial and social revolution, Malevich offers a spiritual dimension to abstraction , paving the way for the Futurist and Constructivist movements, and showing that art can be a universal language, independent of the object represented.
Salvador Dali - The Temptation of Saint Anthony (1946)
Salvador Dalí: The Unconscious in Color
Then came Dalí, who explored the subconscious and dreams through paradoxical, often hallucinatory images. Melting clocks, suspended figures, unreal landscapes: each painting is a bridge between reality and the psyche , a territory where physical and logical laws fade. Dalí transformed art into introspective exploration , making the invisible visible. In the context of the interwar period, his work shocked and fascinated: it freed thought, invited us to question reality and showed that art could become a tool for the human mind to cognition .
Marina Abramovic (left), “Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present,” at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, March 2010.
Marina Abramović: the body as language
In the 1970s, Abramović revolutionized art through performance. Her prolonged, motionless, and sometimes harrowing actions transformed the body into a medium of perception and communication . The viewer became an integral part of the work, both witness and participant. Abramović demonstrated that art does not need a tangible object: it can be experience, tension, and presence , a direct exploration of time, patience, emotion, and human interaction.
Miguel Chevalier - Botanical Pixels, Paris, 2025
The contemporary avant-garde: between digital and magic
Today, the avant-garde is nestled in digital technology and AI. The artist becomes an architect of experiences , guiding the viewer's gaze and gestures. A few examples suffice to illustrate this movement: Miguel Chevalier creates constantly evolving interactive projections, Adrien M & Claire B transform movement into visual and sound forms, and Rafael Lozano-Hemmer makes works vibrate to the rhythm of the audience's heart. Even AI becomes an accomplice: Mario Klingemann generates images where human and algorithmic creativity blend.
These creators show that contemporary art retains the audacity of the visionaries of yesteryear: it questions, surprises and invites us to perceive the world differently.
A vision that transcends time
All these artists share a common audacity: that of seeing beyond the present. They don't just reflect the world: they reinvent it. They provoke, question, and inspire. Their gestures, their inventions, their canvases, their bodies, their algorithms, remind us that art is a language of the future, capable of revealing what we never dared to imagine.
In a world where creativity sometimes clashes with routine, these visionaries are forging new paths. Whether they use a paintbrush, a robot, or an algorithm, their mission is the same: to defy expectations and invite everyone to see the world differently. And perhaps true avant-garde genius is measured by this: the ability to dare to dream what no one has dared to dream before.
Paola Levy
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