Alfred Pauletto

Grave in the Hörnli cemetery

Alfred Pauletto (artist name Alfredo Pauletto , also APC; born October 19, 1927 in Bischofszell ( TG ); † December 24, 1985 in Arlesheim ( BL )) was a Swiss painter , graphic artist , draftsman and illustrator . He was a representative of abstract art and Informel in Switzerland.

Life

Alfred Pauletto was born in the canton of Thurgau as the son of Alfredo and Maria Candio and grew up in Gossau until the family moved to Basel in 1932. 1942–1947 he graduated from the arts and crafts school in the graphics class , where he met his first wife Maya Pauletto. In addition to graphics, he also took drawing lessons from Walter Bodmer and Theo Eble , as well as font painting lessons from Theo Ballmer and Jan Tschichold . He graduated in 1947. At school he got to know Cioma Schönhaus . Schönhaus recalls Pauletto's apprenticeship as follows:

“Even as a student in the graphics class at the general trade school in Basel , Theo Eble's landscapes were far above average. Walter Bodmer praised his figurative drawings, Max Schulzbacher his colors, Berthold von Grüningen thought he was predestined to become a painter. "

The commercial art chose it deliberately as a profession and main source of income in order to be free and to be able to realize his artistic concerns without physical pressure and specifications. “Alfred Pauletto wanted to be free and only commercialize his craft, but not his soul. [...] In this way he could paint without hindrance what had to come out of him, ”reported Cioma Schönhaus.

Between 1949 and 1961 he was awarded the State Art Credit Prize, Basel, twice, and the Federal Art Prize (then Federal Art Scholarship) twice. The panel painting "Brass Music", which was awarded the 1st prize of the art credit in 1956 , was acquired by the canton to decorate the Niederholzschule.

For almost twenty years he worked as an examiner for graphics at the Basel vocational school. From 1950 he worked as a freelance graphic designer (graphic studio), working almost exclusively for one client: Ciba AG . For years Pauletto designed the CIBA Blätter (in-house magazine; published 6 times a year) and the CIBA Journal, as well as occasional medical documents and advertising material. As a member of the Federation of Graphic Designers (BGG), he served as its president for two years.

In 1948 Alfred Pauletto made his first study trip to Paris , where he kept traveling back and meeting his former classmate from the Basel vocational school, Jean Tinguely . There he discovered Informel , a style of abstract art that had been created shortly before in the Paris studios. Another popular destination for his studies was of course Italy from north to south, especially Florence , which he visited regularly. He also made an extended study visit to the Swiss Institute in Rome .

Pauletto first took part in an exhibition in Zurich in 1955 , while his first solo exhibition also took place in Zurich in 1958. In 1962, together with Hans Erni , Celestino Piatti , Hugo Wetli and Kurt Wirth , he brought about a project on the subject of “graphic artist as painter” at the Kunstverein Olten . In the same year he found an entry in the Vollmers General Lexicon of Fine Artists of the XX. Century .

He remained lifelong friends with contemporary Swiss painters and graphic designers such as Donald Brun , Walter Bosshardt, Roger Humbert and, in particular, Herbert Leupin and Cioma Schönhaus .

From 1978 onwards, Alfred Pauletto also appeared as a gallery owner by setting up an “artists' meeting point” with a gallery called “Zur Löwenschmiede” on Untere Rheingasse, where various Basel painters have since exhibited.

Alfred Pauletto chose Alfredo Pauletto as his stage name, whose Italian sound he considered more suitable for an artistic appearance. Around the 1970s he began to sign his works with APC, the abbreviation for "Alfredo Pauletto Candio", whose background Hans Jürg Kupper explained as follows:

“The painter brothers Kurt and Alfred should not be confused; but the surname Pauletto seems to encourage confusion; so Alfred only draws with APC: C for Candio, the name of the mother, at the same time the name of another artist related to Pauletto. "

plant

Pauletto's first paintings go back to his student days and were to be assigned to Cubism and objectivity. By breaking down the representational into its individual parts, he came to abstraction. With works like “Tissue” he asserted himself as a representative of informal art. During the 1950s he mainly created wall and panel paintings and other large formats, obviously based on the Italian fresco . He mainly used the oil technique , but also developed mixed techniques from oil, sand and tar . The latter made it possible to emphasize not only shape, color and perspective but also structures, with which Pauletto was able to give the Informel another dimension. He always attached great importance to well-selected material: at times he made his own colors with pigments and lime and also tried protein glazes .

The fact that Alfred Pauletto had "processed" "suggestions" from foreign abstract painters has been viewed by art critics from the beginning of his work as "to be assessed positively".

In 1959 Alfredo Pauletto made his first trip to Japan , where he stayed in Osaka , Kyoto , Nara and finally Tokyo . He brought his works of art with him from Switzerland and held three solo exhibitions, one of which was in the Haku-ho Gallery in Osaka, coupled with photograms by the Basel photographer Roger Humbert , a friend from the vocational school. He “was appointed to the Kyōto Art Academy to teach students his self-developed tar and sand technique”. Some works in this technique were then created in Japanese studios after his stay. At the same time he studied Indian ink drawing with Japanese masters. The watercolors "characters", which were created after his stay in Japan, point to the inspiration he received from calligraphy .

In 1981 he traveled again to Kyoto, where he again dealt intensively with the Japanese artistic heritage. Evidence of this is the sequence of images of the "Samurai", the mysterious images in which "the dark colors and the depictions are reminiscent of Alberto Giacometti ". Series of pictures of horses based on the models from Kiyomizu-dera in Kyoto were also created.

Fascinated and inspired by the book The Ship of Fools by Sebastian Brant , which was the most famous late medieval book, he painted the picture of the same name in 1979.

One of the main themes that Alfredo Pauletto had throughout his career has been music. Pauletto had just won the 1st State Art Credit with his panel painting “Brass Music”. His work “Musiksaal” is very representative in this genre. The picture was taken in 1980 at a time when the artist and the photographer Niggi Bräuning regularly visited and sketched Paul Sacher's rehearsals for the Basler Kammerorchester (BKO) . By dealing intensively with Paul Sacher's musicians, Alfredo Pauletto experienced a turning point in his artistic expression: the transition to representational painting. From the late 1970s onwards, more and more figurative pictures were created. But already in 1952 a music scene was created with the painting “Cathedral”, at that time in the Cubist style. In 1980 Alfredo Pauletto painted a picture of the same format, with the same perspective and structure. The Basel Minster is clearly visible on it . In the same period Pauletto's encounter with spirituality became more and more evident. In his work he has given more and more importance to the invisible in order to express, among other things, his vision of eternal life. In this endeavor, he had to achieve the symbolism of the classic biblical themes such as Golgotha , Apocalypse or Genesis . These were the themes that Pauletto used for his last large-format works.

When he was sick and felt that his life was coming to an end, Alfredo Pauletto expressed those new themes that surrounded him, such as "suffering, farewell and death". Initially it was about delicate small formats with Indian ink and pencil. This is how the series of "Dances of Death" was born. He has reworked the age-old motif , which stages macabre skeletons and people, but faithfully.

“The extraordinary lies in the threatening intensity of the painterly gesture. Pauletto takes the figures into vibrating brush script, combining painterly surfaces with drawings in ever new overlays. Death plays the trumpet, whitish swinging lines make him a dancer. The subject is tried out graphically on hand-sized leaves: touching lines of the pen, soft ink washings transport the dancing couple into the visionary and supernatural. "

- Alexander Marzahn

During the 1980s, Alfredo Pauletto turned more and more to figurative painting, with a preference for portraits. They are images "[...] which have an oppressive effect because of the rudimentary, figurative sign language. The left half of the face is sometimes larger than the right, the eyes empty and hollow, the mouth like a large hole. The facial expression is like a death mask ”. In some portraits , facial features of well-known artists such as Stravinsky , who worked closely with the Basel Chamber Orchestra in the 1950s and 1960s, or Beckett can be recognized.

Painting technique and style

Much has been written about Pauletto's painting style. The overall impression that Pauletto's works give was aptly summarized by Claude Richard Stange as early as 1959:

“[...] Pauletto's painting now flows entirely from this intimate relationship between man and himself, a basic relationship that precedes all further relationships. The fact that this basic impulse is genuine gives this painter its authenticity; that this basic impulse is not simply given, but is fought for and carried out in every single picture, this gives Pauletto's painting the drama and his color the expressive power. Because here there is no reporting or narration, there is no more or less embarrassed swimming in the wake of a more mature role model, no, Pauletto emerges in every single one of his pictures. This is the decisive factor. "

The Basler National-Zeitung reported the following on Alfredo Pauletto's personal painting style :

“What is essential with Pauletto is personal expression. It is not the lyrical tone that resonates with others, but rather a dull, dramatic sound that is mainly present in the dark-ground works. […] The personal language seems to be found in many of the exhibited works. In these works he handles the color intensely and vigorously; it combines with the rhythms of the forms and creates a very harmonious whole. It is as if this young painter wanted to disrupt a personally formulated harmony through the turmoil of the present. [...] everything at Pauletto is tightly ordered, rhythmically joined, maybe sometimes a bit dark and dull, but then again full of craftsmanship. Not everything is impressive; because it's not a pleasing art, but it's a powerful, idiosyncratic statement that must be taken seriously. "

Franz Gerhard described the panel painting "Brass Music", which was awarded the 1st prize of the art credit in 1956, as:

"A graphically and colorfully exciting, aggressive composition of musical instruments and blowing heads, which actually gives the impression of strong, loud brass music in its harmony."

And so the art author Elise Grilli described the technique of the Basel painter:

"Alfred Pauletto's work is grounded on a complex and compact foundation of ideas and techniques. [...] The materials are now in flux, and new chemical compounds may soon take the place of the sand and the oil pigments with which Pauletto is creating a variegated pictorial surface, but these materials considerations are merely one element of his complex design . The abstract patterns move in many planes. Shimmering beneath the outermost layer are receding "pockets" of air and space which move back into areas incalculably deeper than the old recessions of linear perspective. There is no apparent conflict between the flat mural surface and the infinity of expanding space. The resolution of these opposing forces is made in the spectator's own eye, in his own "reading" of the rhythmic network of line and color. The allusions to astronomical space are also the result of suggested indications. The flashes of color sparks in areas of black, often overlaid with nebulae of white or gray, also tend to call to mind the images of an expanding universe newly conjured forth in scientific plates. "

The art journalist and painter Hans Jürg Kupper tried to formulate key interpretations of Alfred Pauletto's oeuvre:

“What makes Alfred Pauletto's painting (oil, watercolor) unique? An unforced combination of drawing (line) and painterly elements (color, surface). Their penetration is often so great that it becomes clear: the recognizable objectivity is not Pauletto's primary concern; rather, it is the realization that intermediate areas are more important - if not clearer - statements. Those "intermediate areas" would be roughly defined as follows: death in life, life in death; an eternal becoming; the immortality of "energy" lust. Pauletto records these areas: in "whirling" things from his narrowest area of ​​experience; but everything "real" has to submit to the clear idea. Words from Shakespeare's Macbeth become webs of color; Cemeteries become festival places (the old interpenetration of the dance of death and mummery is relived); magnificent halls become stages where Memento mori is played. "

Shortly thereafter, he added:

“The immediate experience (reflexes) is connected with living with it (reflections); while the latter is the actual ground of the picture in the Genesis and Apocalypse pictures, the first in the latest nature pictures are the stuff that painting is made of: here Pauletto reacts very well to his inner being with "nature", to his attunement to the voices of the lights , Waves or grass. "

It is remarkable that Pauletto's extraordinary expressiveness was noticed very early on. CR Stange was impressed to draw attention to this as early as 1960:

“Up until now, he was only known from studio visits, and suddenly this painterly work stands before us, which surprises us because it surpasses most of what we are currently painting in terms of quality. [...] a work that already has its beginnings behind it. This painter now succeeds in not using the boundless freedom and the incalculable possibilities afforded by the "peinture informelle", but in using it as a formal language and as an instrument that is fully deployed and persevered in almost every picture. It is quite admittedly that Pauletto benefits from all the achievements of modernity, from Cubism, from abstraction and its founders Mondrian, Kandinsky and Klee, as well as from the informals, but this density of experience gives him a very independent basis. Pauletto shows himself to be a painter who, well equipped, has completely stepped out of any provincial framework and who now succeeds in painting unconstrained works whose impulse emerges from the timeless and spaceless in order to appear richly articulated on the picture surface. This painter never leaves it at the "idea", every movement, every view and every feeling is expressed as comprehensively as possible, pushed far into the material, and every picture closes in harmony with surface tension and deep layering, which creates freshness, calm and movement. which reach the viewer very quickly, as this is addressed in a variety of ways in terms of its breadth and depth. "

This power and ability to bring his innermost feelings picturesque expression, is the whole body of work recognized the Pauletto. Enrico Ghidelli wrote about Pauletto's late works:

"In the last years of his life there was hardly a disease that he did not suffer from, but especially in difficult times he developed extraordinary strength and painted his body and soul his pain and fears."

He found his final resting place in the cemetery on the Hörnli in Basel.

Prizes and awards

• 1949: 4th State Art Credit Prize, Basel
• 1956: 1st prize State Art Credit, Basel for the panel painting “Brass Music” and acquisition of the painting for the Niederholzschulhaus
• 1960: Federal Prize for Fine Art
• 1961: Federal Prize for Fine Art

Exhibitions (selection)

Solo exhibitions

• 1958: Galerie Bel Etage, Zurich
• 1959: Gallery Haku, Osaka, Japan
• 1959: Kyoto Gallery, Kyōto, Japan
• 1959: Gallery of Isetan Department Stores, Tokyo, Japan
• 1960: Hilt Gallery, Basel
• 1961: Hilt Gallery, Basel
• 1961: Binningen school building
• 1963: Galerie Knöll, Basel
• 1975: Exhibition of Basel Artists , Seltisberg
• 1978: Galerie zur Löwenschmiede, Basel
• 1980: Christmas exhibition, Galerie zur Löwenschmiede, Basel
• 1983: Galerie Landhaus near Zurich

Group exhibitions

• 1955: Graphic artist - a job description , Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) / Zurich Museum of Design
• 1956: Issuance of the State Art Credit , Basel Sample Fair
• 1958: Galerie d'art moderne, Basel, Art vivant exhibition
• 1962: Kunstverein Olten, painting exhibition Graphic artist as painter: Hans Erni, Alfred Pauletto, Celestino Piatti, Hugo Wetli, Kurt Wirth
• 1976: town house, Zurich
• 1976: Galerie Atrium, Reinach / BL, group exhibition Alfred Pauletto, Kurt Ruepp, Max Fröhlich, Adelheid Hanselmann-Erne, Ilse Immich

Retrospective solo exhibitions

• 1987: Retrospective Alfredo Pauletto , Berowergut, Riehen
• 1992: Galerie Simone Gogniat, Basel (drawings)
• 1992: Gymnasium Bodenacker, Liestal (painting, over 100 pictures)
• 1996: Deloitte & Touche Tohmatsu International, in the Experta house, Basel
• 1997: Hilt Gallery, Basel
• 2007: TERTIANUM St. Jakob-Park, Basel
• 2011: Hilt Gallery, Basel, “Alfredo Pauletto | Memories of a Basel painter "
• 2013: Urs Joss - sculptures; Alfred Pauletto - drawings , private exhibition in the Klingental studio community, Basel, December 6-29, 2013.

Publications

• Alfred Pauletto: Tageblätter - Alfredo Pauletto APC , Basel: self-published, 1979
• Max Ehinger (text) and Alfred Pauletto (Illustrator): Evviva la Ponte Pro: Sports as he was back then ... . Basel: Verlag TIP, 1968

Literature (selection)

Lexicons

• Charlotte Fergg-Frowein (ed.): Kürschner's graphic artist's manual. Germany, Austria, Switzerland. Graphic artists, illustrators, caricaturists, commercial artists, typographers, book designers . Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1959, p. 132.
• Pauletto, Alfred . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General Lexicon of Fine Artists of the XX. Century. tape 6 , supplements H-Z . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1962, p. 332 .
• Eduard Plüss, Hans Christoph von Tavel: Artist Lexicon of Switzerland: XX. Century . Volume 2: Le Corbusier-Z . Verlag Huber & Co., Frauenfeld 1963-1967, p. 718.
• Swiss Institute for Art Research (Ed.): Directory of artists in Switzerland 1980-1990 - Répertoire des artistes suisses 1980-1990 . Verlag Huber & Co., Frauenfeld 1991, ISBN 3-7193-1045-0 , p. 482.
• Karl Jost (Ed.): Biographical Lexicon of Swiss Art . Volume 2: L-Z . Swiss Institute for Art Research, Zurich / Lausanne 1998, ISBN 3-85823-673-X , p. 805.
• General artist lexicon: Bio-bibliographical index AZ , Volume 7, KG Saur, Munich / Leipzig 2000, ISBN 3-598-23910-6 , p. 607.

Awards

• State art credit 1956. Jury report on the results of the tenders in 1956 .
• Swiss painters and sculptors awarded a federal art grant since 1950 , Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau, 1963, page 15.

Exhibition scripts

• Claude Richard Stange: Alfred Pauletto - Roger Humbert . Painting and photograms , catalog for the exhibitions in Japan, 1959.
• Josef Rast: Graphic artist as painter: Hans Erni, Alfred Pauletto, Celestino Piatti, Hugo Wetli, Kurt Wirth . Olten: Kunstverein Olten, 1962.
• Dorette and Heinz Dürsteller: Alfred Pauletto, Kurt Ruepp (pictures), Max Fröhlich, Adelheid Hanselmann-Erne, Ilse Immich (jewelry and objects) . Reinach: Gallery Atrium, 1976.
• Fritz Weisenberger, Niggi Bräuning, Andreas F. Voegelin: Retrospective Alfredo Pauletto (APC) 1927-1985 . Riehen: Riehen municipality, 1987.
• Alfred Pauletto - On the life and work of the artist , (text for the exhibition at Deloitte & Touche) Basel, May 1996.
• Enrico Ghidelli: Alfredo Pauletto: For the artist's 70th birthday . Galerie Hilt, Basel, 1997 (publication accompanying the exhibition).

items

• Elise Grilli, "Art, East and West - A Young Swiss Painter in Tokyo", The Japan Times , August 1, 1959.
• Claude Richard Stange: Basilisk - independent Basler Wochenzeitung , No. 1960/4, February 19, 1960, p. 2.
• Cioma Schönhaus : "Alfredo Pauletto", Basler Zeitung , January 7, 1986, p. 20.
• Helmut Kreis: "Inexhaustible Fantasies", Baslerstab Stadt No. 265, November 14, 1997, p. 19.
• Alexander Marzahn: "Alfredo Pauletto", Basler Zeitung , No. 271, November 20, 1997, Part IV, p. 45.

Web links

• Pauletto, Alfred. In: Sikart ( database on art in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein )
• Alfred Pauletto in the general artist dictionary . Retrieved March 1, 2012 . 
• Galerie Hilt: biography of Alfred Pauletto. Retrieved March 1, 2012 . 

Individual evidence

1. ^ Alfred Pauletto and the city of Basel in the diagram of the Museum der Moderne Salzburg: EXPRESSIONISMS - Abstract Expressionism, Informel & CoBrA (from around 1940): Important representatives and their connections. (pdf) (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on November 3, 2015 ; accessed on November 1, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
2. ↑ Regio Aktuell (Basel), NR. 2/2011 (February 2011), page 70.
3. ^ Hilt Gallery: Alfredo Pauletto (1927-1985). (htm) Retrieved March 1, 2012 . 
4. ↑ Basler Zeitung , January 7, 1986, p. 20.
5. ^ Enrico Ghidelli: Alfredo Pauletto: For the artist's 70th birthday . Hilt Gallery, Basel, 1997.
6. ^ Basler Zeitung , January 7, 1986.
7. ↑ Swiss painters and sculptors awarded a federal art grant since 1950 , Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau, 1963, p. 15.
8. ↑ jury report on the results of the tenders of 1956 .
9. ^ Ay, "The Exhibition of the State Art Credit", Basler Nachrichten , 2nd Supplement to No. 501 Abendblatt, 23 November 1956, p. 2.
10. ^ Franz Gerhard, Basilisk - independent Basler Wochenzeitung , No. 1956/28, November 1956, p. 3.
11. ↑ Zurich University of the Arts: Graphic Designer - A Job Profile, February 5, 1955 - March 20, 1955. Retrieved March 1, 2012 . 
12. ↑ Josef Rast. Graphic artist as painter: Hans Erni, Alfred Pauletto, Celestino Piatti, Hugo Wetli, Kurt Wirth . Olten: Kunstverein Olten, 1962.
13. ^ "Artist meeting point at the Loewenschmiede", Baslerstab Stadt , January 1979.
14. ↑ Hans Jürg Kupper, "Zur Löwenschmiede: Alfredo Pauletto", Basler Zeitung , No. 286, December 6, 1979, p. 47.
15. ^ Gb, "A young Basler paints abstract", National-Zeitung Basel , No. 71 Abendblatt, February 12, 1960, p. 5.
16. ↑ Claude Richard Stange. Alfred Pauletto - Roger Humbert. Painting and photograms , catalog for the exhibitions in Japan, 1959.
17. ↑ Elise Grilli. "Art, East and West - A Young Swiss Painter in Tokyo," The Japan Times , August 1, 1959.
18. ^ Article "Basler Künstler in Japan", Basler Nachrichten , No. 291 Abendblatt, July 14, 1959, p. 4.
19. ^ Enrico Ghidelli: Alfredo Pauletto: For the artist's 70th birthday . Hilt Gallery, Basel 1997.
20. ^ Helmut Kreis, "Inexhaustible Fantasies", Baslerstab Stadt , November 14, 1997, p. 19.
21. ^ Bge, The world is a ship of fools: Pauletto exhibition at the Bodenacker high school in Liestal , 1992.
22. ^ Helmut Kreis, "Inexhaustible Fantasies", Baslerstab Stadt , November 14, 1997, page 19.
23. ^ "Alfredo Pauletto", Basler Zeitung , No. 271, November 20, 1997, Part IV, p. 45.
24. ^ Bge, The world is a ship of fools: Pauletto exhibition in the Bodenacker high school in Liestal .
25. ^ Claude Richard Stange: Alfred Pauletto - Roger Humbert. Painting and photograms , catalog for the exhibitions in Japan, 1959.
26. ^ Gb, "A young Basler paints abstract", National-Zeitung Basel , No. 71 Abendblatt, February 12, 1960, page 5.
27. ^ Franz Gerhard, Basilisk - independent Basler Wochenzeitung , No. 1956/28, November 1956, p. 3.
28. ^ Elise Grilli, "Art, East and West - A Young Swiss Painter in Tokyo," The Japan Times , August 1, 1959.
29. ↑ Hans Jürg Kupper, Basler Zeitung , No. 286, December 6, 1979, p. 47.
30. ↑ Hans Jürg Kupper, Basler Zeitung , No. 245, October 18, 1980, p. 47.
31. ^ CR Stange, Basilisk - independent Basler Wochenzeitung , No. 1960/4, February 19, 1960, p. 2.
32. ^ Enrico Ghidelli: Alfredo Pauletto: For the artist's 70th birthday . Hilt Gallery, Basel, 1997.
33. ↑ See Swiss painters and sculptors awarded a federal art grant since 1950 , Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau, 1963, p. 15.
34. ↑ See WERK-Chronik, "Das Werk: Architektur und Kunst = L'œuvre: architecture et art", Volume 48, Issue No. 3, 1961, p. 54.