Often referred to as the father of op-art, Victor Vasarely was born in the Hungarian city of Pécs. He studied in Budapest and then moved to Paris with his family in 1930, where he remained until his death at the age of 90 in 1997. Though he never moved back to Hungary, he began donating art to Budapest's Museum of Fine Art at a time when realism was the only acceptable art form: he wanted to show that there were greater possibilities. This museum, which is in Óbuda, the oldest area of the city, in the former storage area of the Zichy Palace, opened in 1987 with 400 donated pieces of Vasarely's art. Downstairs are a number of his earlier graphic artist pieces, and upstairs are larger pieces of colorful, geometric art. There is also a museum in his hometown of Pécs, where Vasarely started a foundation devoted to his work and that of his wife, the artist Claire Spinner.