Gottfried Honegger
From the singular to the plural

Artists : Gottfried Honegger with Max Bill, Marcelle Cahn, Ad Dekkers, Richard Paul Lohse, Aurelie Nemours, Jan J. Schoonhoven

This new chapter of the review of the collection highlights Gottfried Honegger, the founder of the Espace de l'Art Concret. Born in 1917 in Zurich, Honegger began his career as a display designer, while also creating figurative paintings for his own enjoyment during the 1930s. He attended a preparatory class at the Zurich School of Applied Arts (Kunstgewerbeschule), and later became a decorator, graphic designer, and exhibition curator.

In 1937, Honegger opened a graphic design studio with Warja Lavater, a former student of his school, who would later become his wife. They shared, with other Swiss artists such as Max Bill, an artistic view of advertising, which they considered a form of social art.

In the early 1950s, Honegger turned to abstraction. His compositions reflect a slow process of distillation from reality, and the signs they present still carry the memory of tangible objects referenced in the titles. The compositions, however, feature already very defined structures, marked by contrasts of forms, materials, and colours. Gradually, nature became a major source of inspiration through which the artist analysed the relationship between art and nature.

Already seeking to curb personal expression in his creations, Honegger began to embrace chance, which also plays a key role in nature’s creative processes. His work then tended towards a simplification of forms. Drawing inspiration from enlarged photographic views of microscopic images, he renounced depth of field, perspective, and reduced spatial structure to a flat surface. The signs became autonomous and formed structures. In 1956-1957, Honegger abandoned all connection to the real world and fully committed to abstraction. Close to the Zurich concrete artists, he remained, however, attached to the pictorial and continued to oppose the application of predetermined programmes. His paintings became untitled compositions, with the surface divided into more or less contrasting fields of colour, some offering the viewer a white grid covering the underlying colour planes.

Honegger distanced himself from the dominant trend of gestural painting, and his works were more akin to counter-currents that would emerge at the end of the 1950s, particularly with the NUL and ZERO groups, some members of which, like Ad Dekkers or Jan J. Schoonhoven, are present in the Albers-Honegger collection.

In 1957, he created his first Tableaux-Reliefs: "I wanted to make art that, while using a determined geometry, was individualistic. The introduction of relief catches the light on the canvas. The changing light alters the composition: it introduces chance. In this way, I was able to combine determinism and chance." By pasting cut-out cardboard elements on canvases according to a predefined grid and covering them with several layers of monochrome paint, the painting becomes nothing more than planes and colours, referring only to itself, echoing the principles of concrete art theorised in 1930 by Theo Van Doesburg.

However, Honegger distanced himself from concrete art by using chance as a creative process, particularly through the use of dice or computer systems to generate random designs. This approach set him apart from the Zurich concrete artists such as Max Bill or Richard Paul Lohse, whose works were created according to precise, predefined systems.

In 1958, following a trip to New York, he abandoned graphic design to fully dedicate himself to his career as an artist. His various travels and international exhibitions allowed him to meet many artists in Europe and the United States, who would both influence his artistic practice and form a large part of the abstract geometric art collection he created with his partner Sybil Albers.

At the beginning of the 1990s, the artist freed himself from traditional painting and abandoned the concept of the canvas, starting to create "objects" in aluminium. Echoing the issues initially explored by conceptual and minimal artists, he distanced himself from the traditional craftsmanship and gestures associated with painting, making his sculptures using industrial techniques and materials. Painting was soon reintroduced at the heart of his work, but the forms now appeared standardized, and the colour was applied mechanically.

Initiated with his Tableaux-Espaces, his reflection on the dialogue between the artwork and the architectural space became central. The coloured surfaces gradually revealed the wall supporting the relief. The movement of the viewer became a component of the work, leading to a reflection on contemplation and the world around us.

Beyond his artistic practice, Honegger was also a collector. With his partner Sybil Albers, they formed a collection representative of the various trends in geometric abstraction. This richness fostered a permanent dialogue between works from different horizons, between theoretical propositions and specific sociological and political contexts.

Faithful to the universalist spirit of concrete art, the collectors did not limit their collection to purely geometric works. They expanded its scope through a reflection on the most significant, sometimes surprising, developments that the 20th century produced, turning their collection into a work in itself. This free, almost cheeky, outlook is the very foundation of this collection, amplifying its historical significance through the discovery of unexpected territories.

Gottfried Honegger and Sybil Albers decided to create the Espace de l'Art Concret in the Château de Mouans-Sartoux in 1990 and donated this collection to the French State in 2002. Donations from artists, such as that of Aurélie Nemours, were later added, highlighting the connections between the artists and the space.

Gottfried Honegger was determined to educate children's artistic vision from an early age, to move away from a society too focused on consumption and too little on creation and aesthetics. He developed artistic educational tools such as the Jeu du Viseur, the Écouteur, and the Jeu du Carré, which allowed the public to learn to look, in the sense of "helping the gaze to become creative, not just a consumer."

The many public commissions he carried out were also oriented towards this social approach. His notable achievements include stained glass windows (Nevers Cathedral, St. André Church in Mouans-Sartoux), where Honegger succeeded in merging art that integrates with architecture and reconciling form and colour through the medium of light: "We need works that integrate into architecture, into everyday life, so that we are constantly in the presence of the beauty of art."