Josef Felix Muller Biography
Josef Felix Muller was born in 1955 in Eggersriet in the canton of St. Gallen, Switzerland. He spent his childhood on his parents' farm in the St. Gallen Rhine Valley. After completing his training as an embroiderer, he began working as an artist in the mid-1970s. Muller was inspired by the neo-expressionism of the New Savages, an artistic movement that reached maximum notoriety in the 1980s, for the representation of the human body and its instincts, with an often violent style.
In 1980, Muller began working on the themes of sexuality, death and violence, receiving great appreciation and success in the artistic field. In 1981, during an exhibition in Freiburg, the police confiscated his cycle of works «Drei Nächte - drei Bilder» (Three Nights - Three Paintings) considering them "obscenity publications". Muller successfully appealed to the European Court of Human Rights, thus confirming the right to artistic freedom, which was then incorporated into the Federal Constitution of the Swiss Confederation.
In 1987, Muller created the three-color woodcut “Kopf mit Hand” (Head with Hand), one of his most famous works. This engraving is part of the Mobiliare collection. In the 2000s, Muller dedicated more and more time to landscape painting, enriching his works with details of photorealism.
In the 1980s, Muller was considered one of the most important representatives of the New Savages along with Miriam Cahn, Martin Disler, Peter Emch, and Klaudia Schifferle. Since 2012, Muller has focused on artistic immediacy, applying a more spontaneous style in his works.
