Building on Art – Graphic Works by
Le Corbusier over Fifty Years

Exhibition in the Architekturforum Zurich, 22. March to 13. April 2013

Le Corbusier’s graphic oeuvre comprises almost
200 works and is part of an artistic production that
functioned as the source as well as prerequisite
for his architecture. Galerie Mera is presenting a
representative cross-section of these mostly hand-
signed prints, produced between 1916 and 1965,
and never before seen to this extent outside of Paris.
The sale exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue.

Unbelievably productive, unimaginably creative: LC is a
maniac of creativity, equally as an architect and an artist.
He is guided by «that which is most important in life»:
poetry, «the creations of spirit». Thus, Le Corbusier the
architect can only be comprehended if one sees in him
the painter, the draftsman, the graphic artist as well.It is
not without reason that he valued the statement that
the key to his architecture lay in his artistic work. LCs
graphic works are an integral part of his oeuvre: between
1916 and 1965 he was almost continuously working on
lithographs or engravings, in which he dealt with all of
his central themes. His complete graphic output finally
comprised almost 200 works, most of them hand-signed.

He took much care in the execution of his prints. With
his sense of mission, they were for him also a means of
communication: thanks to them he could spread his ideas
and convictions, and for a relatively low price. In 1963,
he wrote to his lithographer, Mourlot, for example, that
his graphics were «à disposition des gens intelligents
et pauvres (!) qui seraient ravis de payer très bon marchè
un mural de papier à punaiser sur leurs murs.»

In the sale exhibition put on by Karin and Tomas Rabara,
one has the opportunity to view – and for the first time
outside of Paris – among other works, Le Corbusier’s
earliest artist graphics, including «Fontaine de la grande
pitié et de la grande tentation à Bienne» of 1916. Also
on display are Le Corbusier’s first «real» lithographs,
such as the works printed in 1937/38 in an edition of
100 by Mourlot, as well as the artist poster that LC
designed for the 1938 exhibit devoted to him at Kunst-
haus Zurich. Included are also some aquatint etchings
from the series «Unité» which remained unfinished
as a result of his death in August 1965.  back


 

For our current range of works of Le Corbusier, see: art-lc.com

 

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