Burkhard Mangold from Basel left his mark on Swiss poster art
Two exhibitions and a book are being held to honor the work of Basel artist Burkhard Mangold on the 150th anniversary of his birth. As a painter and commercial artist, he played a key role in shaping the distinctive «Swiss Style» in early 20th-century poster art.
The series of posters for the vacation and spa town of Davos from the decade of the 20th century became icons of Swiss advertising graphics. One of the most striking examples is the elegant, dancing ice-skating motif from 1914, but the five-part wide-format poster that juxtaposed five winter sports motifs in the lettering "Davos" is particularly striking.
Burkhard Mangold, born in 1873 and died in 1950, "decisively helped shape the history of the artist poster in the first quarter of the 20th century," Thomas Bolt praised the artist in 1990 in the book "Das Plakat in der Schweiz. And in 1911, the art historian Rudolf Bernoulli, in the "Mitteilungen des Vereins der Plakatfreunde, Berlin," attested to the artist's work a "jolly and mischievous smile.
His beloved city of Basel was always at the center of the work of the artist, who was also sometimes described as "irredeemably verbaslert". Here he left his mark with numerous wall and facade paintings. On calendar pages and in free artistic works he immortalized many city views and for the Basel carnival he designed lanterns and train costumes.
Witty and ironic motifs
But to limit it to Basel alone would not do justice to Mangold's life's work. He created his posters, some of which seem somewhat strange from today's perspective, for clients from all over Switzerland.
For example, for the announcement of the parade of the Wolfensberger printing company in Zurich, he designed the image of a huge wooden wolf, reminiscent of the Trojan Horse, being pulled through the streets by a groaning crowd of people.
A distinctive element in his works, which stylistically range from Historicism to Art Deco, is the design of the typeface, which is always adapted to the motif. And the sometimes surprising choice of the image detail, which often seems deliberately like the spontaneously chosen section of a larger whole.
Artistic commercial art and free art
"Not least in this way, Mangold draws the viewers of the works into the middle of the pictures, as it were," says Tilo Richter. Richter is the curator of the two-part exhibition celebrating the artist's 150th birthday.
The Rappaz Museum exhibits commercial art, namely posters, calendar pages and lantern designs. And in the kHaus, as the head building of the Basel Kaserne is called, the free artistic works can be seen. These show Mangold as an independent and remarkable artist, who, however, as a sought-after commissioned graphic artist, had little time for years to occupy himself with actual painting, as he himself once remarked.
The exhibition "150 years of Burkhard Mangold - the applied arts" runs only until September 17. The reason given for the short duration is the light sensitivity of the exhibits. (SDA/Dominique Spirgi)
