Design: Participatory Art

Neiman-Marcus is already touting it as the "chic Christmas gift of 1969." The day it went on sale at Bloomingdale's in Manhattan last week, lines formed as if something were being given away. Not quite. The bulky box labeled Vasarely Planetary Folklore Participation No. 1 costs $500. For that, the customer receives 390 colored, magnetized plastic pieces to be arranged at will within a 20-in. by 20-in. frame —plus the added attraction of hanging a work of art he can claim, truthfully enough, to have put together himself.

The kit's real creator is Hungarian-born, Paris-based Painter Victor. Vasarely, the most articulate theoretician of the op movement and longtime believer that art should be not merely a luxury for the rich but available to everyone (or almost everyone). Since Vasarely's paintings fetch upward of $16,000, the obvious way to cut costs was to mass-produce the medium and let the purchaser do the work. Once he hit upon the idea of using movable plastic units, Vasarely applied the fundamental idiom of his paintings—geometry and color. All pieces are snugly interlocking circles and squares and come in 19 carefully chosen, generally compatible shades. A small suction cup is provided for easy manipulation.

The kit also includes programmed directions—each piece is coded on the back—for three of Vasarely's own compositions. But Vasarely advises buyers to forget his own schemes and urges them to figure out their own. That way they may learn something about taste and design. Also about frustration. For though the pieces fit together easily enough, producing a balanced and pleasing arrangement is a true test of ingenuity and self-control. Says one new planetarian: "I couldn't stop. I worked until dawn and got so irritated I nearly screamed. Vasarely's paintings always looked like child's play to me. Now I understand all the long years of work behind them."

Purchasers may find that their years of work are only just beginning. The kit's mathematical potential for producing different compositions adds up to a 281-digit figure, or 5,971,415,683,544,067, followed by 265 zeros. Which means, theoretically anyway, that a diehard—and his heirs—can create a different design every day just about from here to eternity.