Artis 31: Max Bill

Max Bill was a Swiss designer, born in 1908.  From 1924 to 1927 he was in an apprenticeship as a silversmith, but then went to study at the Bauhaus in Dessau until 1929.  He then moved to Zurich and in 1944 he became a professor at the school of the arts on Zurich.  Then in 1953 Bill along with a few others founded the Ulm School of Design in Germany.  It started out in the same tradition as Bauhaus, but later took a new approach on education, integrating art and science.  Although the Ulm School of Design opened in 1953 by 1968 it was closed.  Max Bill was an industrial designer and his work was characterized by clear designs and precise proportions.   He tried to create visual representations of the New Physics of the early 20^th century, he wanted to make art in a way that the new science could be understood by the senses.  Bill was not a rationalist, he was a phenomenologist, he understood that the ultimate expression of concrete art was embodiment.  He became a member of the Swiss National Council in 1967 and a professor at an art school in Hamburg at the same time.  Then in 1973 he became an associate member of the Royal Flemish Academy of Science, Literature and Fine Arts in Brussels, three years later he became a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts.  In 1983 he created a granite sculpture that was installed as public art next to the Bahnhofstrasse in Zürich.