Marcel Joray

Sculpture 1966

For the fourth time in twelve years, Bienne is taking the pulse of sculpture in Switzerland.
The jury has chosen 174 sculptures from over 500 works submitted by 140 artists. The jurors tried to assemble the most typical works from the various currents to which our sculptors feel themselves drawn. Some visitors will be pleased to find names with which they are familiar from earlier editions of the show; at the same time there are new and unknown talents to discover who give our exhibition a more youthful face.
But the new face is also due to a completely changed setting. After the wide-open lakeshores of 1962 that were exceptionally favorable to many large-scale works but where pieces of lesser dimensions or not conceived for an outdoor setting found themselves very nearly lost, this year’s edition features sculptures that relate to architecture. Limited space was rediscovered and with it an intimacy that befits many works without getting in the way of the monumental sculptures. Here the sculptures are placed in a man-made context that is worthy of them (because the Palais des Congrès, which the architect Max Schlup conceived as an appropriation of space, ultimately turned into a remarkable work of art in its own right due to the virtues of its creator) – sculptures connected to architecture, or integrated into it, or engaged in a dialogue with it.
Two great Swiss sculptors, both recently deceased, were to be honored here: Alberto Giacometti and Zoltan Kemeny. Swiss-born with a career that tied him to Paris the former, of Hungarian descent but naturalized in Switzerland the latter. Kemeny eventually settled in Zürich and created almost his entire œuvre there. Both conquered the world and were awarded the Grand Prix of the Venice Biennial, Giacometti in 1962, and Kemeny in 1964. Their work is represented in the great museums of the world and they remain our best ambassadors. We are showing a wonderful group of Kemeny sculptures but only a few pieces of Giacometti because the Kunsthalle in Basel is currently showing an exhibition dedicated entirely to his work.
Although the exhibition is limited to Swiss artists we felt justified to include two prestigious foreign artists among the participants for important services they contributed to the arts in our country: Jean Arp, resident of Locarno and Meudon, whose generosity affords us the privilege to honor several artists with important prizes; Francesco Somaini, to whom we owe thanks for bringing our exhibition of 1958 to Como, Italy; Arp is one of the glories of 20th century sculpture; Somaini, one of the most authentic creators of the younger generation
Marcel Joray
Translation French – English © Dieter Kuhn