page_title: Sonia Delaunay
section_title: Spanish and Portuguese years (1914–1920)
hierarchical_section_title: Sonia Delaunay / Biography / Spanish and Portuguese years (1914–1920)
caption_attribution_description: English: Sonia Delaunay wearing Casa Sonia creations, Madrid, c.1918-20 Français&#160;: Photographie de Sonia Delaunay portant corsage et chapeau en raffia, ombrelle, Madrid, 1918
context_page_description: Sonia Delaunay was a Ukrainian-born Russian artist, who spent most of her working life in Paris. She formally trained in Russia and Germany before moving to France and expanding her practice to include textile, fashion, and set design. She co-founded the Orphism art movement, noted for its use of strong colours and geometric shapes, with her husband Robert Delaunay and others. She was the first living female artist to have a retrospective exhibition at the Louvre in 1964, and in 1975 was named an officer of the French Legion of Honor.
  Her work in modern design included the concepts of geometric abstraction, and the integration of furniture, fabrics, wall coverings, and clothing into her art practice.
context_section_description: The Delaunays travelled to Spain in 1914, staying with friends in Madrid. At the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 Sonia and Robert were staying in Hondarribia, in the Basque Country, with their son still in Madrid. They decided not to return to France. In August 1915 they moved to Portugal where they shared a home with Samuel Halpert and Eduardo Viana. They discussed an artistic partnership with Viana and their friends Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso, whom the Delaunays had already met in Paris, and José de Almada Negreiros. In Portugal she painted Marché au Minho (Market in Minho, 1916), which she later says was "inspired by the beauty of the country". Sonia had a solo exhibition in Stockholm (1916).
  The Russian Revolution brought an end to the financial support Sonia received from her family in Russia, and a different source of income was needed. In 1917 the Delaunays met Sergei Diaghilev in Madrid. Sonia designed costumes for his production of Cleopatra (stage design by Robert Delaunay) and for the performance of Aida in Barcelona. In Madrid she decorated the Petit Casino (a nightclub) and founded Casa Sonia, selling her designs for interior decoration and fashion, with a branch in Bilbao. She was the center of a Madrid Salon.
  Sonia Delaunay travelled to Paris twice in 1920 looking for opportunities in the fashion business, and in August she wrote a letter to Paul Poiret stating she wanted to expand her business and include some of his designs. Poiret declined, claiming she had copied designs from his Ateliers de Martine and was married to a French deserter (Robert). Galerie der Sturm in Berlin showed works by Sonia and Robert from their Portuguese period the same year.
caption: Sonia Delaunay wearing Casa Sonia creations, Madrid, c.1920
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