Bruno Baeriswyl

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Bruno Baeriswyl (born August 11, 1941 in Freiburg im Üechtland , Switzerland ; † October 23, 1996 there ) was a Swiss abstract painter, sculptor and lithographer of lyrical abstraction . After Jean Tinguely, he is the most famous contemporary artist from the canton of Friborg . However, its public reception was largely limited to a Catholic milieu that opened up to the modern .

Life

Bruno Baeriswyl was the eleventh of twelve children (five brothers and six sisters) into the family of the roofer Peter Alois Baeriswyl from St. Ursen and Olga Cécile Baeriswyl, née Zbinden, from the hamlet of Zumholz near Plaffeien , in the "Schiffhuus", a house born in Freiburg's Neustadt. The former shipbuilding workshop was demolished nine years later and the family moved to the poor Basse-Ville in the old town. The parents were Roman Catholic , but conveyed socialist convictions to their children, which was unusual in the ultra-conservative city. They also took care of the music, even when money was always tight and the brothers Peter, Emil and Bruno - who all called "Tchita" - received drawing lessons. His art training was self-taught and based on personal support from artists.

In 1953, Bruno Baeriswyl met the painter Ernest Riesemey (1907–1967), a neighbor and employee of a family milk shop who began to promote the adolescent's artistic development. The young person's decision to become an artist received the support of those around him and he was allowed to set up a studio in the attic. The drawing teacher Albin Kolly (1919–1992) made him known in contemporary art and jazz .

In 1957 Bruno Baeriswyl turned an apartment above a café on Klein-St.-Johannplatz into his studio. After completing compulsory school, he found a job in the cardboard factory Vuille, his job , where he finally worked in the development department. He later stayed afloat with orders as an architectural model maker. His first exhibited works from 1958 onwards showed his affinity for Paul Klee and Serge Poliakoff . He mixed ash and paint using a technique he developed himself. In 1959 he became acquainted with the circle of the artist group Mouvement founded in 1957 by the photographer Jean-Claude Fontana , which took him on in 1961 and gave him the opportunity to have a first exhibition.

After that, Baeriswyl had to go to the recruiting school . He later stated that the nocturnal gun drills had left him with a lasting aesthetic impression. During this time the art critic Jean-Christophe Ammann became aware of Baeriswyl. In 1962, for example, he received the first of three federal art grants . He made friends with fellow painters Raymond Meuwly and Paul Castella . He also began working with the Museum of Art and History Freiburg . In 1963 Bruno Baeriswyl married Margot Schelbert from Basel, with whom he had four children.

In 1963, with a further federal grant, he temporarily gave up the ash technique and developed a painting style that was applied with a brush with oil paint and was based on abstract expressionism . At the same time, small-format gouaches were created . In 1966 the young family moved into a farmhouse in Montagny-la-Ville that had been converted into a studio . In 1969, an abstract act caused a scandal in Freiburg when a museum visitor thought he saw something offensive and alerted the police, but the cantonal conservator refused to remove the pictures. Further exhibitions followed e.g. B. 1968 in Lausanne and 1972 in Yverdon-les-Bains , 1973 in Charmey , which were quieter. He then separated from his wife, from whom he divorced in 1974. From then on he lived with the changing partners.

Numerous commissions and acquisitions from municipalities, private companies and public and church institutions formed his artistic field of activity from the mid-1970s. Individual works were given as gifts from the Swiss Confederation to international organizations, for example to the International Labor Organization in Geneva in 1989 . Almost all of his works in public spaces are located in the canton of Friborg. In 1989 he married Catherine Kohler, with whom he had had a daughter since 1983. Solo exhibitions of Baeriswyl's works took place almost exclusively in western Switzerland . Baeriswyl was buried in the Cimetière de Saint-Léonard cemetery in Friborg. The Association des Amis de Bruno Baeriswyl keeps the memory of the artist alive.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Robert Savary: Bruno Baeriswyl. In: Find a Grave . February 7, 2017, accessed April 29, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Colette Guisolan-Dreyer, In: Bruno Baeriswyl 1941-1996; Biographical Notes . Ed .: Yvonne Lehnherr et al. 1st edition. Benteli Verlag / Musée d'art et d'histoire Friborg, Bern 2001, ISBN 3-7165-1248-6 , p. 139-153 .
  3. ^ Alberto de Andrés: Baeriswyl, Bruno. In: Sikart

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Baeriswyl, Bruno
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss abstract painter, sculptor and lithographer of lyric abstraction
DATE OF BIRTH August 11, 1941
PLACE OF BIRTH Freiburg im Üechtland , Switzerland
DATE OF DEATH October 23, 1996
Place of death Freiburg im Üechtland , Switzerland