Matias Spescha
The Trun-born artist is present here on several occasions. In addition to the exhibitions in Spazi Spescha and the walk-in sculpture OGNA, there are two other sculptures on the art trail along the Rhine and a large sculpture in front of the Trun town hall.
Matias Spescha is one of the most important Graubünden artists between Alberto Giacometti and Not Vital and is considered an important Swiss artist of the post-war period.
His work is also internationally recognized.
Change to abstraction
After his early transition from naturalism to abstraction, which Matias Spescha completed in Paris, he found his own form of expression in 1959, shortly after moving to the village of Bages in the south of France.
Spescha’s interactions between Bages and Switzerland became ever closer over the decades. On the one hand, this was due to the growing interest in his art in his home country, which was reflected in an increasing number of exhibitions and then also increasingly in commissioned works and works in public spaces.
On the other hand, this “axis” Bages-Trun, with its intermediate stops in Zurich and Chur, became important for the careers of many young Graubünden artists who were inspired by Spescha.
Vom Bild zur Skulptur
Around 1970, Matias Spescha took the step towards sculpture, but at the same time remained faithful to painting and printmaking. With the inclusion of the third dimension, space became increasingly important to him and became his basic theme:
“The place of his painting is the transition from real to suggestive space, the path from the outside to the inside. His painting is an art of transcendence.” (Matthias Frehner in: Matias Spescha, monograph 2000).
This development towards an increasingly ascetic-looking abstraction, which opens up a new dimension for the viewer in space and thus allows him to become part of the “work of art”, is increasingly evident in later projects such as L.A.C., an installation in the Lieu d’Art Contemporain (2001 in Sigean, France).
Prizes & awards
1986: Prize of the Foundation for Graphic Art in Switzerland
1993: Culture Prize of the Canton of Graubünden
1999: Culture Prize of the Canton of Zurich
Biography
1925: born on July 17 in Trun (Bündner Oberland, Graubünden, Switzerland)
1941-1951: Apprenticeship as a tailor, works in the Trun cloth factory
1951-1955: Poster painter for the Corso cinema in Zurich
1955-1958: Stay in Paris, Académie de la Grande Chaumière
since 1958: Lives and works in Bages (Departement Aude, Southern France). Since then commutes between Bages and Zurich, his second home.
2008: died on June 28 in Zurich
Important links
Homage to Matias Spescha in the House of Art Bages, France 2009 (film documentary on the exhibition, with English commentary).
Exhibition in the Schöntal Monastery at Basel 2010/11, curated by Guido Magnaguagno, President of the OGNA Foundation from 2012.
For the OGNA opening in Cultural square, Swiss Television 2013.
