Jean Tinguely Biography
Tinguely Jean (Fribourg, 1925 - Bern, 1991) Jean Tinguely was a Swiss artist of the 20th century. He studied at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Basel from 1941 to 1945, a period in which he discovered the art of Schwitters and Klee, becoming a great admirer of the Bauhaus. In 1944 he began to experiment with movement in space with his machine-sculptures, equipping them with electric motors, which he turned at high speed. In 1951 he moved to Paris, where he participated in international happenings organized by Rauschenberg and joined the "Nouveaux Rèalistes" group, exhibiting his works in their exhibitions. In 1954 he had his first solo exhibition at the Galerie Arnaux, in which Tinguely presented his pre-programmed machines, the so-called "Mètamatics", that is, machines that reproduce drawings or self-destruct. These constructions conceptually represent an attack on the technological era. Tinguely also exhibited work at the Paris Biennial (1959) and became part of the “ZERO” group, becoming internationally famous in the mid-1960s. He exhibited at “Documenta” in Kassel between 1964 and 1977. In 1961 he married the artist Niki de Saint-Phalle, with whom he installed the female sculpture “Hon” at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm in 1966 and in the same year he participated at the exhibition “The Machine". In 1980-81 he created the fountain “La Fontaine Stravinsky” in Paris with Niki de Saint Phalle and throughout the 1980s he continued to create large projects, exhibitions, sculptures and fountains, which soon conquered everything the world
