Erwin Walter Burger Biography
Erwin Burger was born in 1909. Despite being a cutter and engraver with long experience at Fontana Arte, in 1945 he decided to embark on his own career. His artistic production, based on the experiences of the 1930s, thanks to the collaboration with artists such as Pietro Chiesa for his drawings of vases and Giacomo Manzù for his sculptural works, acquires an increasingly original character. His random blocks of scrap, clearly inspired by Aristide Colotte's engraved works from the 1930s, transform into ambivalent structures that combine human and animal elements, and can only be fully appreciated from different angles. The artist himself declares that he does not want to convey profound psychological statements; what emerges with enthusiasm in his works is a close affinity with the animal world. The comparison between one of his masterpieces, the wild horse's head of 1051, and its stylized predecessor of 1934, clearly reveals a continuity on the one hand and, on the other, a notable increase in expressiveness due to the emotional condition of the time. These works continue the line already present in the years before the war, but strengthen their organic thrust to the point of almost resembling artefacts produced in a furnace.
