Portrait: Gerhard Zörner 1996

Eugen Gomringer

* 1925 Cachuela Esperanza, Bolivia

Eugen Gomringer studied economics and art history in Bern and Rome (1946-1950). In the 1950s he founded the eugen gomringer press, the magazine Spirale (with Dieter Roth and Marcel Wyss) and assisted Max Bill at the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Ulm. In the 1960s he published the book series ”konkrete poesie – poesia concreta“, was a member of the documenta Council, headed the Swiss Werkbund and the advertising department of an industrial company, and advised Rosenthal AG (until 1985). In the early 1970s, he published the art portfolios ”edition keller“ and the book series ”Kunst und Umwelt“, and founded the Archive for Concrete Poetry at Schloß Erkersreuth. From 1977 to 1990 he was Professor of Theory of Aesthetics at the Düsseldorf Art Academy, 1986 Visiting Professor of Poetics in Bamberg, 1988 Director of the International Forum for Design in Ulm. In 1984 Eugen Gomringer opened a gallery in Rehau, Upper Franconia, where he also founded the Institute for Constructive Art and Concrete Poetry in 2000. His extensive collection of Concrete Art and Poetry forms the basis of the Museum für Konkrete Kunst in Ingolstadt, which opened in 1992. Den Begriff Konkrete Poesie prägt Eugen Gomringer 1953 in Analogie zum Begriff der Konkreten Kunst.