Max Gubler
Born in 1898.
Died in 1973.
A landscape of the Limmat, a desiccated bouquet, a face: Max Gubler finds in the subjects closest at hand a field for pictorial experimentation. The force of colour and the energy of the brushwork transform these familiar motifs. Between observation and expression, his figurative painting occupies a singular place in 1940s and 1950s Zurich, where Concrete art was also developing.
His first supporters, the art dealers Paul Cassirer and Han Coray, made this choice possible. After several stays in Italy and Germany, he went to the island of Lipari in 1924 with Maria Gronenschild, his future wife. The Mediterranean years introduced luminous landscapes and figure compositions into his work.
The couple subsequently settled in Paris in 1930, then in Unterengstringen in 1937.
Near his home and studio, Gubler continually found new motifs. Landscapes, portraits and still lifes allowed him to explore the relationships between form, light and matter. Nature morte au chardon dans un vase bleu et à la corbeille de pommes, held in the Mobilière collection, brings together the dryness of the plant with the brilliance of the fruit and the vase.
The movement of the brush gives a vivid intensity to this evocation of the fragility of things.
A serious health crisis interrupted his career in 1957, but he continued to paint: nearly four hundred paintings were produced during the following three years, between clinic and studio.
To discover his work, observing the brushwork is as revealing as identifying the subject: its density, speed and interruptions make the painting a sensory experience of looking.
