Background
Samuel Buri was born on September 7, 1935 in Täuffelen, Obwalden, Switzerland. In 1948 his family moved to Basel, where his father, the theologian Fritz Buri, officiated as pastor of St. Alban's Church and later of the Minster.
Samuel Buri was born on September 7, 1935 in Täuffelen, Obwalden, Switzerland. In 1948 his family moved to Basel, where his father, the theologian Fritz Buri, officiated as pastor of St. Alban's Church and later of the Minster.
In 1953 - 1955 Samuel attended a painting class of Basel trade school.
In the winter of 1952 - 1953 Samuel Buri participated for the first time in the annual Christmas exhibition in the Basler Kunsthalle. In 1955 he assisted Hans Stocker in the execution of mosaics and glass windows. At the beginning of winter 1956, his first half-abstract winter pictures were taken in Habkern in the Bernese Oberland, and in the summer of 1956 in Greece abstractions of the sea were created. By 1957, the brightly colored images with stained or gestischem paint application and decorative color gradients were becoming increasingly abstract. From 1957 Buri received numerous orders for art in construction. Together with his wife, he moved to Paris at the end of 1959.
In Paris, on the one hand, the influence of the French painting tradition became important, on the other hand, he felt the confrontation with international contemporary art. In 1959 - 1961 Buri's abstract color visions acquired a lyrical and atmospheric quality. In 1961 there was a turn to geometrical abstraction with accented diagonals, horizontals and verticals. Then he returned to figuration under the influence of the Anglo-Saxon Pop Art, which he developed into an own expression with floral motifs, representations and subjects inspired by domestic life in rural life in acrylic paint as well as various synthetic materials and stencil technique. The end of the Pop Art phase in Buri's work coincided with the political unrest in France in the late 1960s. He participated in 1968 and in the following years in artistic actions and installations, such as in 1969 in the exhibition "For all kinds of changes" in the Kunsthalle Basel. During 1971 - 1981 Samuel taught at ENSET in Paris.
The move to Givry in Burgundy in 1971 marked the beginning of a new creative phase. While still in Paris, Buri was inspired by a visit to the Salon de l'agriculture for the production of life-sized sculptures of cows made of plaster or polyester, which he painted with colored patterns. Plastic works on the topics of painting and nature followed. In the early 1970s, in Burgundy Buri began to increasingly paint again in front of the motif. The result was more naturalistic work with a very painterly character, depictions of nature, into which the experiences from abstract painting and pop art flow.
Since the mid-1970s, Buri has been spending more time in Habkern in the Bernese Oberland, where he has been spending his holidays since his youth and converted an old farmhouse into a living and studio building in 1977 - 1978. At the end of 1979 Buri moved from Burgundy back to Paris. Pictures were created with motifs from the studio. Together with his second wife, the Basel art historian Anna Rapp, he lived during the autumn of 1981 in Zurich, from 1983 in Basel. In 1991 Sanuel had a six month stay in New Mexico, Arizona and California. In 1993 Buri spent two months in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Chicago. In 2003 he worked as an artist-in-residence in Disentis Abbey and presented a selection of his religious works since 1950. In an exhibition at the Haus der Kunst St. Josef in Solothurn in 2004, the artist was dedicated to large-format paintings.
The point of departure for the work of Samuel Buri is on the one hand the French painting of the Impressionists, especially Claude Monet's atmospheric images, the two-dimensional decorative tendency of the post-Impressionists, for example Pierre Bonnard, and the work of Henri Matisse. On the other hand, the expression in the paintings of the Basel red-blue artists as well as the tradition of Swiss landscape painting by Cuno Amiet, Giovanni Giacometti, Ferdinand Hodler and Giovanni Segantini had effected him.
Buri's work, which focuses on canvas paintings, murals, glass windows, mosaics, watercolors and lithographs, has no narrative program. It seeks to challenge the eye through the interplay of color and form and, in the sense of Matisse, to delight in "Joie de vivre." Landscapes, trees, the studio, churches and cloisters, flower and fruit, still life, and portraits are the most important subjects in his work. Central topics are nature and image illusion, the act of painting, and the painter himself. Spectral colourfulness, combinations of complementary color pairs, serial variation of color, juxtaposition of geometric and organic forms, and a penchant for ornamentation are characteristic.
Akt
New Frontiers (Slogan von J.F. Kennedy)
Still life
Greti
Oberland bernois
Des Vaches: Mo, Ni, Que
Untitled
La vue de Pierre Bonnard
Untitled
Châlet psychédélique
Bauerngarten
Fish, Flowers and Fruits
Schulfest Langnau
Mimi au chat
Blick aus dem Atelierfenster
Lehrerschaft
Irisation
Alpenhorn
Abstract Composition
Grille en quatre
Abstract composition
Simon dans le choux
Parasol
Bright bouquet of flowers
Entwurf
Untitled
Delphi
Bunter Tisch mit Früchten
Composition Schwendi
Lustucru
Composition
Samuel Buri has experimented in a variety of both figurative and abstract styles. Buri discarded his early interest in Post-Impressionism in favor of a delicate, lyrical abstract style that blended figurative concerns with some of the techniques of Op art, including grids and repeated patterns.
Quotes from others about the person
The point of departure for the work of Samuel Buri is, on the one hand, the French painting of the Impressionists, especially Claude Monet's atmospheric images, the two-dimensional decorative tendency of the post-Impressionists, for example, Pierre Bonnard, and the work of Henri Matisse. On the other hand, the expressive expression in the paintings of the Basel red-blue artists as well as the tradition of Swiss landscape painting by Cuno Amiet, Giovanni Giacometti, Ferdinand Hodler and Giovanni Segantini have an effect on him. These positions combine Buri with modern elements of a new painting. He analyzes his impressions of nature analytically in order to translate them in an abstract or representational way into areas of heightened color and ornamental rhythm.
Buri's work, which focuses on canvas paintings, murals, glass windows, mosaics, watercolors, and lithographs, has no narrative program. It seeks to challenge the eye through the interplay of color and form and, in the sense of Matisse, to delight in "Joie de vivre." Landscapes, trees, the studio, churches and cloisters, flower, and fruit still life and portraits are the most important subjects. Central topics are nature and image illusion, the act of painting, the painter. Spectral colourfulness, combinations of complementary color pairs, serial variation of color, juxtaposition of geometric and organic forms and a penchant for ornamentation are characteristic. The work in series, the combination of different style elements and at different times, areas and levels belonging motifs are typical features in Buri's work.
In 1959, Samuel Buri met his first wife, the French stage and costume designer Christine Herscher. In 1962, 1963 and 1965 she gave birth to their three children. With his second wife, the Basel art historian Anna Rapp, Samuel moved to Zurich in 1981 and to Basel in 1983. In 1982 and 1987 he became the father of two daughters.