Gottfried Honegger
Gottfried Honegger (1917-2016)
The Swiss painter, sculptor and designer Gottfried Honegger was born in 1917. He studied at the art academy in Zurich (1932) and first worked as a designer (1933-1936). From the age of 20 he concentrated on graphic and commercial art, and it was not until 1957, with the creation of his first ‘tableau-relief’, that his career really began. Painting abstract works influenced by Zurich Concrete art and by contemporary American painting from 1950 onwards, Honegger developed as an artist during his stay in New York (1958-60) where his first exhibition was held at the Martha Jackson Gallery in 1959. In the same year, Alfred Barr, the Director of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, purchased works by Honegger.
Honegger settled in Paris in 1961, where he continued to experiment in painting and sculpture. His pictures were composed following a system and use simple, geometric forms in relief, executed in monochrome but with particular attentin to technique and surface presentation. His shapes (squares, circles) are placed inside an orthogonal frame, following a pattern established beforehand and always based on numerical calculation. The paintings are made up of sharp-edged cardboard pieces placed, with strengthened backing, on to canvas and covered with several layers of paint. In this manner, the artist obtained a relief effect on the surface that catches the light and gives the composition a changeable quality. Honegger also desired to allow chance to play a role in the programming of his works.
His sculpture, which he produced from 1968 onwards, uses cubes, spheres and their multiples, producing system-based structures and relationships. Numerous public commissions in Europe and the USA since 1971 enabled Honegger to apply his theories on a monumental scale. In 1990 he founded, together with his partner Sybil Albers-Barrier, the “Espace de l’Art Concret” in Mouans-Sartoux, in the south of France.
Honegger has been working on a number of public commissions, i. e. in 1982/83 the Régie Renault in Portugal; in 1986 the Institut National Polytechnique, Nancy; in 1996 he designed the ‘Blue square’ of the university Zurich-Irchel and in 1997 the metro station Anagnina in Rome. In 1998, he was commissioned by the Ministry of Culture in France to create a sculpture for the City of Grenoble on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution. The Arts committee for the Olympic Games in Seoul bought a large work for permanent installation in the sculpture park.
Among many other rewards, Honegger was given an honorary prize at the 4th Biennale of European Graphic, which took place in Baden-Baden (Germany) in 1985 and in 1987 he received the Prize of Art from the City of Zurich. The French Minister for Culture appointed him Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in 1985 and Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres in 1996. In 1998, Honegger moved from Paris to Cannes in the South of France. Numerous exhibitions in museums and galleries worldwide; his work is to be found in national and international collections.
Source:
“Gottfried Honegger,” Galerie Proarta, Web, Feb. 1, 2016