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The first ever major publication of Marianne Eigenheer’s work,
published in partnership with the Marianne Eigenheer Estate and von Bartha,
Basel, Switzerland. This book celebrates the diverse practice of the artist,
which spanned over five decades.
About the author
Marianne Eigenheer (1945–2018, Swiss) was a renowned artist and active academic whose work has been exhibited across Europe, Australia
and the United States. As a child, Marianne’s parents had aspirations for her to become a pianist, although she wanted to become a composer. Instead, she began drawing and painting after finishing school and went to art college in Lucerne, Switzerland.
Marianne’s work was featured in Achille Bonito Oliva and Harald Szeemann’s seminal Venice Biennale exhibition Aperto ’80 in 1980, as well as in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Germany – Bonner Kunstverein, Volker Diehl, Galerie Volker Diehl, Zeppelinmuseum and Ludwig Forum fur Internationale Kunst; in the US – Holly Solomon Gallery and the Swiss Institute in New York; and at the Manege Central Exhibition Hall in St Petersberg, Russia, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA) in Australia, and the Meguro Museum of Art in Tokyo, Japan. Her work has also been exhibited in Switzerland – at sic! Raum für Kunst in Lucerne, von Bartha in Basel, and at the Kunstmuseum Basel in 2018.
During her academic career, Marianne was Professor and Director of the Institute for Curatorship and Education at Edinburgh College of Art, where she was granted an honorary professorship in 2009, having worked previously at several universities and art colleges, including the University of Art and Design, Offenbach, and the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart.
Summary
A fascinating and long-overdue study of the
artist’s work spanning five decades of her diverse practice, this
comprehensive and thought-provoking book provides
an overview of Marianne’s oeuvre. It also creates dialogues between different
periods of her work by presenting them alongside one another – many shown
this way for the first time in print. From her spontaneous, gesturally abstract
drawings of the 1970s, to her bolder, more defined, large-scale drawings that gained public attention at the 1980
Venice Biennale, to her lesser-known sculptural and photographic works,
to the wall painting created for Kunstmuseum Basel in 2018 – this book spans
the artist’s creative scope.
The characteristic linear forms that
underscore Marianne’s practice come from the meditative process of
drawing she developed in her lifetime, whereby she externalised her personal
experiences onto paper. Marianne Eigenheer
documents beautifully how the
artist created a highly distinctive and recognisable visual language by working in this way throughout her
career. The book also features a
selection of essays by a diverse group of writers that discuss and explore the
different aspects of Marianne’s practice, shining a light on her work as
artist, writer, curator and teacher.
Foreword
The book accompanies a major exhibition on the
artist, to open at the von Bartha gallery, Basel, Switzerland, in February 2023.
