Heidi Bucher (1926–1993[2]) was a Swiss artist interested in exploring architectural space and the body through sculpture. She was born in Winterthur, Switzerland and attended the School for the Applied Arts in Zurich.[3] Her work dealt primarily with private spaces, the body, domestication, and individual and collective experiences.
Heidi Bucher | |
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Born | Adelheid Hildegard Müller[1] 1926 (1926) Winterthur, Switzerland |
Died | 1993 (aged 66–67) Brunnen, Switzerland |
Nationality | Swiss |
Education | School for the Applied Arts in Zurich |
Known for | Sculpture |
Spouse | Carl Bucher 1960 ending in divorce in the early 1970s[1] |
Website | heidibucher |
Bucher's early work was mainly focused on the body. In the early 1970s, she moved to Los Angeles. While there, she collaborated with her then-husband Carl Bucher on Landings to Wear and Bodyshells. The large-scale, wearable works blurred the boundary between sculpture and apparel, and they were featured on the cover of Harper's Bazaar.[4] An 8mm film shows the oversized foam "Bodyshells" in action on Venice Beach.[5] They were showcased in an exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Crafts (now the Museum of Art and Design) in New York City and exhibited at LACMA in April 1972.[6]
Bucher became more interested in the body's relationship to space in her later work. In the mid-1970s she began experimenting with a new technique, in which she soaked gauze sheets in latex rubber, and used them to cast the interior surfaces of the rooms of her grandparents' house in Winterthur, Switzerland. These were then pulled off in sheets to create thin, skin-like casts of the space;[7] she referred to these casts as "Skinnings."[3] In 2017, she was selected to be part of the main exhibition at the 57th Venice Biennale, VIVA ARTE VIVA.[8]
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