Eva Aeppli
Born in 1925.
Died in 2015.
Eva Aeppli (2 May 1925 – 4 May 2015) was a Swiss visual artist whose work unfolded around constructed figures: first mannequins and fabric characters, then, from the mid-1970s onwards, bronze sculptures and monumental velvet heads. Her methods combined textile insertions and armatures—the textile period is illustrated by works such as Groupe de 13 (Hommage à Amnesty International), 1968, made of silk, kapok, cotton, velvet, iron and wood (250 x 370 cm). The material shift of the 1970s did not entail an abandonment of figurative work: rather, it marked a transition from soft volumes to body-objects hardened by bronze and heads with velvety surfaces, sometimes structured around astrological themes.
Aeppli’s exhibition history has been the subject of institutional revisitations, notably a retrospective in Bonn (1994), the exhibition Garden of the Zodiac in Omaha (2000), and a presentation at Museum Tinguely in Basel (2006).
Sources describe her as a visual artist—a draughtswoman, painter and sculptor—of Swiss nationality. On a personal level, the documents record a separation from and divorce from Jean Tinguely in 1961, followed by a second marriage in 1962 to the American lawyer Samuel Mercer, with whom she shared a life between Omaha (Nebraska) and Paris. In 1990, she founded the Myrrahkir Foundation, based in Omaha, whose stated purpose is to combat poverty, oppression and ignorance.
Documented entries also link her to several museum institutions and collections, including, according to the sources consulted, Moderna Museet, MUMOK, Kunstmuseum Solothurn, Kunsthaus Zürich, and collections in Omaha.
