Born in Russia and immigrating to France at a young age, Nadia Khodossievitch-Léger was a prolific painter, director of the Atelier Fernand Léger — her mentor and husband — a museum builder, member of the Resistance, publisher, and communist activist. Featuring over 150 works, the exhibition traces her remarkable journey, from her native village to Paris, highlighting the influences that shaped her and the artistic communities she engaged with.

This retrospective explores the constant evolution of her style — from Cubism to Suprematism, from Suprematism to Realism, and back to Suprematism — drawing connections between her art and her political and social commitments. It includes unprecedented dialogues between her works and those of Fernand Léger, Pablo Picasso, and Atelier Léger alumni such as Nicolas de Staël, Hans Hartung, and Marcelle Cahn, with works lent by the Fondation Gandur pour l’Art.

A devoted member of the Communist Party and a liaison agent for the French Resistance during World War II, the political dimension of her work is central. From 1947 onwards, her art became a medium for communist thought.

From Tolstoy to Chagall and from Stalin to Chagall, her personal pantheon included political figures, artists, writers, and astronauts, depicted against vibrant blocks of colour. Some of these portraits adorned French Communist Party congresses, while others were transformed into monumental mosaics, offered as gifts, and installed in public spaces in major cities across the USSR.

Long overshadowed by her husband and hard to categorize due to the diversity of her styles and inspirations, Nadia Léger finally claims her rightful place in the history of modern art through this exhibition.