Edited by Raphael Gygax, Heike Munder. Text by Torsten Blume, Eva Díaz, Raphael Gygax, Juliet Koss, Tobias Peper.
In his lifetime, "Xanti" (Alexander) Schawinsky (1904-79) was best known for his work in the theater department at the Bauhaus. Fleeing Germany before the beginning of the Second World War, he landed at Black Mountain College in North Carolina, where in the 1930s he developed his theory of the "Spectodrama." Involving multimedia productions examining elementary phenomena such as space, motion, light, sound or color from scientific, technical and performance-based perspectives, the Spectodrama represents an early form of the "happening." Beyond the avant-garde utopias of the Bauhaus and his proto-happening art, Schawinsky also worked as a painter and graphic designer. Protracted legal disputes over the artist's estate meant that Schawinsky's work was until recently almost inaccessible; Xanti Schawinsky is the first survey of Schawinsky's extraordinarily prolific output over the course of five decades, and a long-overdue resource on the work of this key figure.
"Incontro III" (1968) is reproduced from Xanti Schawinsky.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
The New York Times
Alice Rawsthorn
How could an artist and designer as prolific, gifted and charismatic as Xanti Schawinsky — a central figure in mid-20th-century avant-garde circles in Europe and the United States — have come close to being forgotten?
Huffington Post
Justin Quirk
Schawinsky went on to produce a body of visual work that still looks remarkably fresh. It has the clean, formal discipline that gives away his architectural training, but with a sense - thanks to comic touches, surreal flashes and experimentation - of an artist constantly pushing at the boundaries of genre. Cut-outs, optical tricks, the repurposing of brand identities and early mechanical graphic treatments: all contribute to work which manages to be genuinely avant-garde without snobbishly pushing the viewer away. Schawinsky deserves to be a better known name, both in art and also in the world of graphic identity which now permeates almost all aspects of modern life.
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Born in Switzerland in 1904, Xanti Schawinsky was a prominent proponent of theater at the Bauhaus, a leading teacher at Black Mountain College and a prolific member of the 20th century avant-garde—yet his work came perilously close to vanishing after his death in 1979. Because of a legal dispute, Schawinsky's work was barred from public view for three decades—until his son, Daniel Schawinsky, regained control of his estate in 2012. Fortunately for us, Schawinsky has since been the subject of a comprehensive retrospective at the Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst in Zürich. The accompanying monograph, published by JRP|Ringier, features new scholarship on Schawinsky's pioneering artwork, his tumultuous life as a Swiss Jew and émigré during WWII and his lasting influence on the Happenings and performance art of the 1950s and beyond. continue to blog
FORMAT: Pbk, 8 x 10.75 in. / 176 pgs / 58 color / 31 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $59.95 LIST PRICE: CANADA $79 GBP £37.00 ISBN: 9783037643976 PUBLISHER: JRP|Ringier AVAILABLE: 8/25/2015 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock TERRITORY: WORLD Excl FR DE AU CH
Published by JRP|Ringier. Edited by Raphael Gygax, Heike Munder. Text by Torsten Blume, Eva Díaz, Raphael Gygax, Juliet Koss, Tobias Peper.
In his lifetime, "Xanti" (Alexander) Schawinsky (1904-79) was best known for his work in the theater department at the Bauhaus. Fleeing Germany before the beginning of the Second World War, he landed at Black Mountain College in North Carolina, where in the 1930s he developed his theory of the "Spectodrama." Involving multimedia productions examining elementary phenomena such as space, motion, light, sound or color from scientific, technical and performance-based perspectives, the Spectodrama represents an early form of the "happening." Beyond the avant-garde utopias of the Bauhaus and his proto-happening art, Schawinsky also worked as a painter and graphic designer.
Protracted legal disputes over the artist's estate meant that Schawinsky's work was until recently almost inaccessible; Xanti Schawinsky is the first survey of Schawinsky's extraordinarily prolific output over the course of five decades, and a long-overdue resource on the work of this key figure.