Eugen Gomringer

Eugen Gomringer at the Poetry Festival Berlin (2018)

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Eugen Gomringer (born January 20, 1925 in Cachuela Esperanza , Bolivia ) is a Bolivian-Swiss writer . He is considered to be the founder of Concrete Poetry and has worked mainly in Germany to this day .

Life

Eugen Gomringer was born to a Swiss man, Eugen Gomringer senior, and a Bolivian woman, Delicia Rodríguez. From 1944 to 1952 he studied economics and art history in Bern and Rome . From 1954 to 1957 he worked as Max Bill's secretary at the Ulm School of Design . He transcribed Bill's handwritten notes into typewriter format.

In 1953 he founded the magazine Spirale with Dieter Roth and Marcel Wyss , and from 1960 to 1965 he published the book series concrete poesie - poesia concreta . From 1961 to 1967 Gomringer was head of the Swiss Werkbund . From 1967 to 1985 he headed the cultural advisory board of Rosenthal AG in Selb . From 1977 to 1990 he taught as professor for the theory of aesthetics at the State Art Academy in Düsseldorf . From 1966 to 1968 he was a member of the documenta council under the direction of Arnold Bode for the 4th documenta in 1968 in Kassel . He selected the Swiss contributions to documenta 4, as u. a. Works by Richard Paul Lohse , Karl Gerstner , Christian Megert , Dieter Roth . In 1986 he held a guest professorship for poetics in Bamberg and in 1988 became director of the International Forum for Design in Ulm .

Inspired by Concrete Poetry, Gomringer wrote the advertising of the ABM ( Au Bon Marché ) department store chain for around 30 years .

Since 1971 he has been a member of the Berlin Academy of the Arts . In 2000 he founded the Institute for Constructive Art and Concrete Poetry (IKKP) at his long-term home, Rehau in Upper Franconia . His extensive collection of concrete art and poetry formed the basis of the Museum for Concrete Art in Ingolstadt , which opened in 1992 .

In 1997 Gomringer was awarded the City of Rehau's Culture Prize. In 2008 he was awarded the Bavarian Order of Merit for his services . In June 2010 he and his daughter Nora Gomringer were invited to teach poetry at the University of Koblenz-Landau .

Poem "Ciudad"

Poem avenidas as a wall painting in Berlin since 2011

In 2011, the Alice Salomon University in Berlin awarded the 2011 Alice Salomon Poetics Prize to Eugen Gomringer. On this occasion, the university installed his poem ciudad (avenidas) from 1951 on the south facade. In 1954, the poem was an illustrative example of the “constellation” technique developed by Gomringer, here “from six Spanish words”.

“The constellation is an invitation, not a recipe, neither formally nor thematically, it does not name the“ all too human ”social and erotic problems. If these cannot be solved in life, they may belong in the specialist literature. "

- Eugen Gomringer

The poem avenidas 2018 on the facade of the museum in Rehau

Avenues and flowers and women and an admirer, 2019

In 2017, the General Student Committee ( AStA ) expressed criticism of the wall design with the text of the poem, as it disparaged women, and demanded that they be removed immediately. “It has not yet been decided whether the poem will really be removed. The facade at the university has to be renovated in 2018; this work should also include a possible redesign. But it could also be that in the course of the ideas competition a decision will be made to keep the poem, said a spokeswoman for the university. ” Jürgen Kaube commented on the status of the dispute at the beginning of February 2018 in the FAZ and brought the position of the university's AStA to the Proximity to the Nazi debate about “degenerate art”. The city council of Rehau - Gomringer's place of residence - decided, at the suggestion of the city administration, to have the poem avenidas affixed to the facade of the municipal building at Maxplatz 9. The same was done by the housing association Grüne Mitte Hellersdorf in Berlin, where the poem can be seen on a house facade just two kilometers from the Alice Salomon University - illuminated in the evening and on a second house also in German translation.

Relationship with Bolivia

Although Gomringer hardly worked in Bolivia , he is considered a Bolivian poet there, who is highly regarded in his native region in the Beni department and beyond. At the age of three, he left the legendary jungle town of Cachuela Esperanza and has only returned to Bolivia four times since then. However, he still maintains good contacts with the country's writers and artists. His nickname among Bolivian friends is el Beniano genial ( Eng : “the genius Benian”). The most important newspaper in eastern Bolivia, El Deber , dedicated four pages to him on November 14, 2015 in a special supplement on the occasion of Gomringer's home visit in October. There he presented his work at a conference in Santa Cruz . He further received from the Universidad Autónoma del Beni (UAB) in Trinidad , the honorary doctorate .

Concrete poetry

Poem silencio . Poster in Tarija (2017)

In 1953 Gomringer coined the term Concrete Poetry in analogy to the term “Concrete Art” . In his poems, which play with the materiality of writing and the typeface, he follows the abstract - which he calls constructive - painting of his time. In his central manifesto from verse to constellation, Gomringer explains the conception of the aesthetic object as a functional object.

Karl Riha characterizes Eugen Gomringer with the words: “He is the father of post-war German modernism - and this through programmatic pronouncements as well as extraordinary poetic texts that have retained their elasticity to this day - and beyond today. He is - in the technical as well as in the imaginative sense of the term - an inventor who has permanently changed the language of literature. "

Gomringer writes in German, Swiss German , Spanish, French and English.

Works

constellations. spiral press, Bern 1953.

the hour book. Max Hueber Verlag, Munich 1965.

Command the poetry! : Biographical reports. Edition Signathur, Dozwil 2006, ISBN 3-908141-35-4 .

Poetry about the Weissenstädter See. The book of hours by Eugen Gomringer. Photographer: Marcellus Kaiser. Kaiser, Rehau 2006, ISBN 978-3-939426-00-4 and ISBN 3-939426-00-8 .

see: The Book of Hours by Eugen Gomringer

Together with Anton Stankowski : Gucken - A children's book. Leonberg 1980.

The work of Edgar Knoop . A kinetic program for light, color and movement. In: Light kinetic collages. Light kinetic reliefs. Light kinetic steles. Wilhelm-Hack-Museum , Ludwigshafen, and Heidelberger Kunstverein , Munich 1993.

From the edge inwards, the constellations 1951–1995. Complete work Volume I. Edition Splitter, Vienna 1995, ISBN 3-901190-19-8 .

Theory of Concrete Poetry, Texts and Manifestos 1954–1997. Complete work Volume II. Edition Splitter, Vienna 1997, ISBN 3-901190-34-1 .

On the matter of the concrete, a selection of texts and speeches about artists and design issues from 1958–2000. Complete Works Volume III. Edition Splitter, Vienna 2000, ISBN 3-901190-30-9 .

with Georg Pöhlein and Cornelius Schnauber : Gomringer - Wurlitz. Verlag Bibliothek der Provinz, Weitra 2001, ISBN 3-85252-415-6 .

with Josef Linschinger : The Book of Hours: in Kanji and Code. Verlag Bibliothek der Provinz, Weitra 2005, ISBN 3-85252-627-2 .

Squares of all countries. Complete work Volume IV. Edition Splitter, Vienna 2006, ISBN 3-901190-90-2 .

100 Years of Concrete Art - Structure and Perception. Verlag Bibliothek der Provinz, Weitra 2010, ISBN 978-3-902416-48-3 .

admirador , sonnets, essays, lectures, biographical and autobiographical texts, prose and fairy tales from sixty years. Matthes & Seitz, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-88221-592-2 .

the encounter sonnets , encounter sonnets (translation into English by Markus Marti). EDITION SIGNAThUR, Dozwil 2013, ISBN 978-3-908141-89-1 .

world in sonnet. all sonnets , EDITION SIGNAThUR, Dozwil 2019, ISBN 978-3-906273-36-5 .

Literature and Sources

Jo Enzweiler (Ed.): Eugen Gomringer in conversation with Monika Bugs. Galerie St. Johann, Saarbrücken 2003, ISBN 3-928596-78-0 .
Oliver Herwig: Word design: Eugen Gomringer and the visual arts. Academium, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-89129-726-2 .
Anja Ohmer: Eugen Gomringer and Concrete Poetry. In: orte - Swiss literary magazine, No. 143, Dec. 2005 / January 2006.
Anja Ohmer: Gomringer to the power of 2: Concrete poetry makes sound! In: Say something about the night - or: the Gomringers are here. In: orte - Swiss literary magazine, No. 167, May / June 2011, pp. 36–43.
Concretism: materials. Reader and scientific documentation. Catalog for the exhibition «concreteism. material / language and abstraction since 1955. » BW-Bank, Stuttgart 2006. Selected, collected and edited by Anja Ohmer and Reinhard Krüger.
Annette Gilbert (ed.): Nothing for quick-viewers and book-leafers. Eugen Gomringer's collaborative work with visual artists. Kerber Verlag, Bielefeld 2014, ISBN 978-3-7356-0024-0 .