Armand Schulthess

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Armand Schulthess (born January 19, 1901 in Neuchâtel ; † September 29, 1972 in Auressio ) was a Swiss object and text artist who transformed a forest into a "library of knowledge" in his life's work.

Life

Schulthess (actually Alfred Fernand Armand Dürig ) grew up as an adopted child in Colombier . After his family moved to Zurich, he attended the cantonal commercial school, completed a commercial apprenticeship and then worked as an employee in various companies. From 1923 to 1934 he was the owner of a women's clothing store, which he gave up due to the economic crisis. After stays in Holland and Austria, he found employment in the Federal Department of Economics of the federal administration. In 1941, Schulthess bought a rustico in Auressio , gradually acquired more land and, after quitting his job, moved to his refuge in the Onsernone Valley in 1951 , where he then devoted himself to his major project.

plant

In over twenty years, Schulthess developed a “library of knowledge”: He wrote on thousands of small boards - mostly made of sheet metal - with his knowledge of various cultural and scientific areas, which he had gathered from books and newspapers. He hung the panels in his 18,000 square meter chestnut forest on trees and bushes or mounted them on walls and fences, sometimes individually, sometimes several panels connected by wire structures. The areas of knowledge began along an ascending path with topics such as geology , palaeontology and atomic physics , encompassing natural sciences , history , literary and music-historical data, until they came close to his home in the humanities such as psychoanalysis and esotericism . In the house itself he put on further collections and created a library of self-written and bound books. All of his works have been called the “Encyclopedia in the Forest” by Auressio or “jardin cosmogonique”.

In the fall of 1972 Armand Schulthess was found dead in his garden. Heirs largely destroyed the unique total work of art in the summer of 1973. Only about 600 original works could be saved, which are now kept in private collections. A large number of Schulthess' works can be found in the Casa Anatta Museum, founded in 1981 by Harald Szeemann on Monte Verità near Ascona .

The hermit and eccentric is seen today as an important Swiss artist , related to Art brut . Schulthess' work was shown posthumously at several exhibitions: 1972 at documenta 5 in the Individual Mythologies department , where his work was presented in a documentation by Ingeborg Lüscher , and 1975 at Bachelor Machines , 1979–1980 at Monte Verità , and 1983 at Der Hang zum Gesamtkunstwerk and in 1991 at Visionaries Switzerland , all of which were organized by the exhibition organizer Harald Szeemann . In 1974, Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf completed the film J'ai le téléphone about the work and life of Armand Schulthess. Max Frisch was inspired by Schulthess and the “Encyclopedia in the Forest” for his story Man appears in the Holocene . Judith Schalansky , in her book Directory of Some Losses, published in 2018, recalls one chapter of the “Encyclopedia in the Forest”.

Exhibitions (selection)

literature

  • Ingeborg Lüscher: Documentation about AS - The largest bird cannot fly , Dumont 1972, ISBN 3-7701-0651-2 .
  • Harald Szeemann u. a .: Monte Verità. Antropologia locale come contributo alla riscoperta di una topografia sacrale moderna , Casa Anatta, Ascona, Electa, Milan, 1978
  • Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf: An encyclopedic and astrological fixation of borderline situations. About Armand Schulthess . In: Kunstforum, June 1989, 101. pp. 222–234
  • Markus Britschgi (ed.), S. Corinna Bille (text), Theo Frey (photographs): Armand Schulthess (1901–1972) - The Enchanted Garden of Knowledge , Diopter, 1996, ISBN 3-905425-00-9
  • Markus Britschgi (ed.): The encyclopedia by Armand Schulthess . Art Museum of the Canton of Thurgau, Diopter, 1996
  • S. Corinna Bille: L'enfant aveugle , Slatkine, Geneva, 1997, ISBN 2-05101568-6
  • Jean-Hubert Martin: Dubuffet & Art Brut. In the intoxication of art , Museum Kunst Palast, Düsseldorf 2005
  • Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf: Armand Schulthess: Reconstruction of a Universe , Edition Patrick Frey 2011, ISBN 978-3-905509-93-9

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Armand Schulthess - J'ai le téléphone on the website of Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf
  2. ↑ http://www.diopter.ch/publikationen/kunst_schulthess.htm
personal data
SURNAME Schulthess, Armand
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Dürig, Alfred Fernand Armand (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss object and text artist
DATE OF BIRTH January 19, 1901
PLACE OF BIRTH Neuchâtel (city)
DATE OF DEATH 29th September 1972
Place of death Auressio