The latest Collection in Focus is dedicated to the creations of Swiss artist René Acht (1920 – 1998). The exhibition includes works from the 1950s to the 1980s which were presented to the Aargauer Kunsthaus collection in two separate gifts. The thirteen paintings and silhouettes will be placed on public display for the first time. The Aargauer Kunsthaus has co-published the monograph “René Acht: Lyrisch-Konkret” [René Acht: Lyrical-Concrete] in advance of the retrospective.

In 1968, René Acht produced a thematic summary of his own artistic development. He assigned the years 1951 to 1955 to the dual concept “lyrical-concrete”, which were annotated with the words “ungegenständlich” [non-representational], “Zen” and “Bissier”. Acht chose the description “lyrical-concrete” to contrast himself with the Concrete Art introduced in 1924 by Theo van Doesburg: unlike Concrete Art, the non-representational esthetic and geometric designs are charged with symbolic meaning. This phase was also influenced to a great extent by a meeting with Julius Heinrich Bissier in 1951, from which a long friendship was born. Mutual visits and a lively exchange of correspondence are the expression of their shared interest in metaphysical painting, which attempts to determine the significance of Man’s contribution to spiritual and material creation. Inspired by this friendship, Acht intensified his examination of  Zen Buddhism and “East Asian philosophy”, concepts which substantially informed the symbolism not only in this creative phase but also throughout his oeuvre as a whole:

“The act of searching […] led me to the eastern way of thinking, and through this to the very basis of perceptions. Inspired by this, I attempt to capture and model the essence of things, but without neglecting the problems of color, shape, time and space.”