Takis (Panayiotis Vassilakis, 1925–2019) was a self-taught Greek sculptor celebrated for pioneering kinetic art, where invisible natural forces—wind, magnetism, electricity, light—become the materials themselves. Influenced by ancient Greek Cycladic figures and modern sculptors like Giacometti, he moved to Paris in 1954, where he developed his signature Signaux (Signals): slender iron rods topped with bells or bulbs that sway in the breeze, capturing spatial energy and creating sound—an early fusion of nature, spirituality, and art as sensory experience. Across the 1960s, he expanded into télé‑sculpture, magnetic sculptures, and musical environments, collaborating with figures like Duchamp and performing feats such as suspending a man using magnets in 1960.

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