Colonne

Max Bill (Winterthour, 1908 – Berlin, Germany, 1994)
Collection : Fonds d'art contemporain de la Ville de Genève (FMAC)

The prolific artist Max Bill single-handedly embodied twentieth-century modernism in all its diversity. Simultaneously a painter, architect, sculptor, designer, graphic designer, theorist, publisher, professor, exhibition organizer, writer and politician, he had an active career in all areas of art. After first working as a goldsmith, he went to study at the Bauhaus and contributed to research on functional art alongside eminent figures of the avant-garde. The artist’s tall granite column first appeared in Geneva in 1972 on the steps of the Musée Rath during a solo exhibition of his work, before finding its permanent home at Place du Bourg-de-Four. Faithful to Bill’s world – which was based on rational principles and mathematical references, and took the theories of concrete art as its point of departure – the column stands on a triangular section, which develops into an octagon, creating a set of winding facets. As is the case in all of the artist’s sculpted work, Max Bill replaced the intuitive approach with logical structures, without reference to the world of appearances. Beauty had to emerge from a concept and not from any content external to the form.
Article commissioned by P3Art
Notice: Séverine Fromaigeat, translation: Matthew Cunningham

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