Heidi Bucher

Heidi Bucher, Bellevue Kreuzlingen, 1990

Heidi Bucher (b. 1926, Winterthur, CH, d. 1993 Brunnen, CH) began her oeuvre with abstract collages and illustrations after studying fashion in Zurich the 1940s. She soon developed a distinct practice fusing sculpture and performance, ranging from sculptural costumes to latex and caoutchouc casts. In the mid-1970s, Bucher began to dip domestic items into natural and synthetic rubber, ranging from clothing to blankets and furniture. These intimate objects are transformed into smooth pictorial surfaces, which evoke women’s crafts and the home, motherhood and memory, but also sexuality and patriarchal structures. Soon, Bucher made latex and caoutchouc ‘skins’ of architectural features, whole rooms and facades, which represented a breakthrough in her practice. She made these rubber casts in spaces that had a strong bearing on her own biography, such as her grandparents’ house, the Ahnenhaus (house of ancestors) or a tiled fridge room in the basement of her studio in a former butchery in Zurich, the Borg, an invented word evoking Burg (fortress) or Geborgenheit (intimacy, safety). The artist also worked in historically charged buildings in the geographical proximity of her hometown, including the decaying former bourgeois hotel Grande Albergo, and the psychiatric institution Bellevue.
The intensely physical process of Heidi Bucher making these works is documented in several short films. It involved embalming rooms and façades through hand application of the liquid rubber and pigments, often covering windows, doors and the floor. Following this laborious process, Bucher would ‘skin’ the rooms with the help of assistants, slowly stripping off the leathery surfaces. While the embalming may evoke caring or nursing, the ‘skinning’ of the rooms is an assertive, almost radical action.

Heidi Bucher, Fleigende Hautraum, 1981

Heidi Bucher’s works became part of performative activities when Bucher and her assistants carried the latex rooms through the streets of her hometown like a parade of floating rooms, or hung the ‘skin’ of a long corridor in the Ahnenhaus from a flagpole on its façade. Fleigende Hautraum (Flying Skinroom), 1981, captures the liberating act of a room flying through the air as it was craned out of its original location. These activities evoke a cleansing ritual followed by a celebration, in which the resultant works act as trophies of a surmounted past.

Heidi Bucher, Bodyshells, Venice Beach, 1972

The film Bodyshells, 1972, shows the entire Bucher family (Heidi, with her husband at the time, Carl Bucher, and their two children, Mayo and Indigo) walking across Venice Beach in LA, wearing soft, iridescent body suits made from foam and brushed with dustings of mother-of-pearl. Large and rotund, the costumes mimicked the shapes and bodies of creatures one might find on the seashore, but in particular molluscs and shellfish, whose delicate invertebrate bodies keep themselves safe within protective nacreous shells. The Bodyshell suits are human-sized portable homes for the wearers, cocoons which further exemplify Bucher’s concern with the house as a shell, a place of safety, as well as a container for memory and trauma.

Born
1926, Winterthur, Switzerland
Deceased
1993, Brunnen, Switzerland

Education

1942 – 1946
School for Applied Arts, Zurich, teachers Johannes Itten and Max Bill,
specialised class Fashion Design, Zurich, Switzerland

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2020
Mendes Wood, São Paulo, Brazil (forthcoming)

2019
Sublime Geometry, Alma Zevi, Venice, Italy
Die Wässer und Libellenlust, The Approach, London, United Kingdom
The Site of Memory, Lehmann Maupin, New York, NY, USA

2018

Heidi Bucher, Parasol Unit, London, UK

2017

Floors: Heidi Bucher and Gordon-Matta Clark, Alma Zevi, Venice, Italy

2014

Swiss Institute of Contemporary Art, New York, USA
Alexander Gray Associates, New York, USA
Art Basel Feature with Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Art Basel, Switzerland
Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Zurich, Switzerland

2013

Centre Culturel Suisse de Paris, Paris, France
Rooms are skins, are surroundings, The Approach, London, UK
Art Basel Feature, Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Art Basel, Switzerland
Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Zurich, Switzerland
Collection on Display: Monica Bonvicini, Heidi Bucher, Tom Burr, Urs Fischer, Pamela Rosenkranz, Markus Schinwald, Cathy Wilkes, Migros Museum für gegen wartskunst, Zurich, Switzerland

2007

Galerie Giti Nourbakhsch, Berlin, Germany

2004

Heidi Bucher – Mother of Pearl, Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich, Switzerland

1995

Kunsthaus / Barlach Halle K, Hamburg, Germany

1993

Villa Bleuler, Galerie im Weissen Haus, Winterthur, Switzerland
Und ziehen das Gestern ins Heute: Die Häute aus dem Bellevue Projekt, Kunstmuseum Thurgau, Switzerland

1981

Räume sind Hüllen sind Häute, Galerie Maeght, Zurich, Switzerland

1979

Parketthaut / Herrenzimmer / Mobili, Galerie Maeght, Zurich, Switzerland
L‘Objet préféré de l‘artiste, Galerie Numaga, Auvernier, Switzerland

1977

Einbalsamierungen, Borg, Galerie Maeght, Zurich, Switzerland

1973

Bodywrappings, Esther Bear Gallery, Santa Barbara, CA, USA

1972

Bodyshells, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, CA, USA

1971

Soft Sculptures to wear, Museum of Contemporary Crafts*, New York, USA
Rothmans Art Gallery of Stratford/Toronto*, Canada
Musée d’Art Contemporain, Montréal*, Canada
*With happenings by Carl Bucher

1958

Silkcollage, World House Galleries, New York, USA

1956

Collagen, Galerie Suzanne Feigel, Basel, Switzerland

Selected Group Exhibitions

2019

Sublimi Anatomie, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, Italy

2018

The House of Fame, Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham, UK
Positionen, Haus für Kunst Uri, Altdorf, Switzerland
Don Quixote, Barbara Weiss, Berlin, Germany

2017-18

The Everywhere Studio, Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, USA
WOMENHOUSE, la Monnaie de Paris, Paris, France; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, USA

2017

20 Years Show, The Approach, London
Viva Arte Viva, Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy
The problem with having a body / is that it always needs to be somewhere, The Approach, London
No Place Like Home, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel
Room, Sadie Coles HQ, London, UK; Warwick Arts Centre, Warwick, UK

2016

Grand Gestures, Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Basel, Switzerland
Hommage à Heidi Bucher und Carl Bucher, Kulturort Galerie Weiertal, Winterthur, Switzerland
Revolution in the Making: Abstract Sculpture by Women, 1947 – 2016, Hauser, Wirth & Schimmel, Los Angeles, USA
Honolulu Triennale, Honolulu Art Gallery, Zurich, Switzerland
Oslo 10, Basel, Switzerland
Frauenpower, Art Dock, Zurich, Switzerland

2015

Artists and Architecture, Variable Dimensions, Pavillon de l’Arsenal, Paris, France
wow! Woven? Entering the (sub)Textiles, KM– Künstlerhaus, Halle für Kunst & Medien, Graz, Austria
Heidi Bucher & Virginia Overton, Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Zurich, Switzerland

2014-15

Supple Expansions, Freedman Fitzpatrick, Los Angeles, USA
Monumental Fatigue: Heidi Bucher, Virginia Overton, Magali Reus, Yorgos Sapountzis, Hannah Weinberge, Freymond Guth, Zurich, Switzerland

2014

Artevida: corpo [body], Fundação Casa França-Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
I Know Not To Know, Georg Kargl Fine Arts, Vienna, Austria
Andrew Roth, New York, USA

2013

Repertory, One Torino, Palazzo Cavour, Torino, Italy
SLIP, The Approach, London, UK
M Sélection. La collection du Musée Migros d‘art contemporain, Musée Rath, Geneva, Switzerland
Collection on Display: Heidi Bucher, Thea Djordjadze, Berta Fischer, Loredana Sperini, Katja Strunz, Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich, Switzerland
Collection on Display: Monica Bonvicini, Heidi Bucher, Tom Burr, Urs Fischer, Pamela Rosenkranz, Markus Schinwald, Cathy Wilkes, Migros Museum für gegen wartskunst, Zurich, CH

2012

My Body is a Cage, Freymond-Guth Fine Arts, Zurich, Switzerland

2011

Chairs, Galerie Giti Nourbakhsch, Berlin, Germany

2010

At Home, Galerie Giti Nourbakhsch, Berlin, Germany

2008

Disguised, Rotwand Gallery, Zurich, Switzerland
Der schone Schein, Museum Bellerive, Zurich, Switzerland
abc Art Berlin Contemporary, Galerie Giti Nourbaksch, Berlin, Germany

2007

Sculpture Park, Bad Ragaz, Switzerland

2004

It‘s All an Illusion – A Sculpture Project, Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich, Switzerland

1993

Mise en Scène, Bex et Arts, Fondation Szilassy, Switzerland
Das Bild hinter dem Bild, Depot der Geheimnisse, Kunstmuseum Olten, Switzerland

1992

Force Sight, Internationale Kunst der Gegenwart, Schloss Preseneck, Neuenstadt, Germany

1990

Passagen Skulptur, Bad Ragaz, Switzerland
Musée de la Peau, Bex et Arts, Fondation Szilassy, Switzerland

1989

Solitude-Echos, Kunstverein Ludwigsburg, Germany

1988

Woher-Wohin, Museum für Gestaltung, Zurich, Switzerland

1986

Aufgemöbeltes / Mobili, Kunstraum Palazzo, Liestal, Switzerland
Portal, Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, Germany
Fabriksaalboden, Kammgarn, Schaffhausen, Switzerland

1985

Objekt Kunst ‑ in ausgewählten Beispielen von Dada bis heute, Kunsthaus Zug, Switzerland
Schloss Schlösser Luftschlösser / Herrenzimmer im Baum, Schloss Lenzburg, Switzerland
Muschelobjekte, Museum Bellerive, Zurich, Switzerland

1983

La femme et l’Art, Trienniale Le Landeron, Switzerland
Herrenzimmer / Ablosrauswegfliegling, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Switzerland

1981

Hautraum Ahnenhaus, Museum für Gestaltung, Zurich, Switzerland

1980

Weich und Plastisch – Soft Art, Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland
Türe zum Borg, Kunsthalle Waaghaus, Winterthur, Switzerland

1979

Verletzlich, Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland
L’univers d’Aimé Maeght, Maison de la Culture, Rennes, France

1978

Aktualität – Vergangenheit, 3. Biennale der Schweizer Kunst, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Switzerland
Berg – Bergen – Geborgenheit, Kunstmuseum Zug, Switzerland
Galerie Haus 11, Karlsruhe, Germany

1977

Kunstmuseum Winterthur

1975

Frauen sehen Frauen, Kunstkammer zum Strauhof, Zurich, Switzerland
Terre des Hommes, Montréal, Canada

1963

Galerie im Weissen Haus, Winterthur, Switzerland

Selected Bibliography

2013

Heidi Bucher, Centre Culturel Suisse de Paris, Paris, France

2008

Sammlung / Collection. Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst Zurich, 1978–2008, ed. Heike Munder, Zurich & JRP/Ringier

2007

Kunsthaus Zurich, Gesamtkatalog der Gemälde und Skulpturen, Zurich,
Kunstgesellschaft, Hatje Cantz Verlag

2006

Affentranger-Kirchrath, Angelika, Skulptur auf Expansionskurs, Neue Züricher Zeitung

2005

Lunn, Felicity, Heidi Bucher, Artforum International, March

2004

Heidi Bucher, ed. Heike Munder, texts by Heike Munder, Philip Ursprung, Mayo and Indigo Bucher, ed. Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich & JRP/Ringier
Bucher, Mayo, Heidi Bucher, Cinematic Biography, Art Adventures, Zurich, Switzerland (DVD)
Bänziger, Kathrin, Kunst im öffentlichen Raum in Winterthur, Stiftung Edition Winterthur, Switzerland
Affentranger-Kirchrath, Angelika, Der Libelle abgeschaut, Neue Züricher Zeitung

1993

Mise en scène. Bex & Arts, text by Nicolas Raboud, photography by Magali Koenig
Heidi Bucher, published by Markus Landert, Kunstmuseum des Kantons
Thurgau, Kartause Ittingen, Switzerland

1989

Unikat und Edition, Künstlerbücher in der Schweiz, Helmhaus Zurich, concept: Marie-Louise Lienhard and Stephan Kunz, text by Marie-Louise Lienhard
Künstlergruppe Winterthur 1989, texts by Rudolf Koella and Adrian Mebold, Winterthur, Switzerland

1985

Moderne Kunst – unsere Gegenwart. Ein Brückenschlag zur Schweizer Kunst seit 1939, Fritz Billeter, Peter Killer, Willy Rotzler, Pfäffikon

1983

Hauträume, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Switzerland

1977

Heidi Bucher, ed. Galerie Maeght, Zurich, Switzerland

1972

Landings. Carl & Heidi Bucher, County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, USA

1971

Carl & Heidi Bucher, Musée d‘Art Contemporain Montréal, Canada

Public Collections

Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, USA
Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
Kadist Art Foundation, Paris, France and San Francisco, USA
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich, Switzerland
Musée Jenisch Vevey, Switzerland
MOMA Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA
Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Winterthur, Switzerland
The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland
Kusthaus Zug, Switzerland
Kunstmuseum Lucerne, Switzerland
Migrosmuseum fur Gegenwartskunst Zurich, Switzerland

7th April 2017 - 14th May 2017