Hans Danuser

Danuser was born in Chur on 19 March 1953. After working in Zürich for the German advertising and fashion photographer Michael Lieb from 1972 to 1974, Danuser began experimenting with light-sensitive emulsion at the ETH Zurich. • 1979–1989: work on the cycle In Vivo • 1980s and 1990s: working in Zürich and New York • 1986: Artist in residence in Los Alamos. • Since the 1990s: large-format series of photographs as installations in space and transdisciplinary projects in the arts and sciences. • Spring 2009: first Visiting Artist at the Centre for Studies in the Theory and History of Photography at the Institute of Art History of the University of Zurich and subsequently visiting professor at the ETH Zurich. In collaboration with Swiss-German pharmaceutical scientist Gerd Folkers, Danuser established the Fondazione Garbald to oversee the restoration of the Villa Garbald. Located in Castasegna and designed by the German architect Gottfried Semper, the villa was subsequently repurposed as a remote seminar and convention center. Today, the facility serves primarily as a retreat for ETH Zürich. Danuser was primarily based in Zürich. Danuser died on 30 August 2024, at the age of 71.

The series of works consists of found and staged stencil paintings, created by means of paint-spray cans on different supports, at the intersection of public and private space. They have been photographed since the 1980s in various cities in Europe and the United States. The ephemeral in the existence of the stencil images on physical substrates is taken up by Danuser's photography and transformed by means of digital image processing and sublimation printing technique on aluminum, into images that in their brilliantly reflective appearance, suggest ephemeral and digital screen surfaces (Peer 2019). • Out of Paradies (1980s–2019)

The Matographs – The-One-Million-Pound-Projekt (work in progress) was developed with the research departments of Ciba-Geigy (today Novartis), Basel, and Bayer Werke / Agfa Gevaert, Leverkusen (today AGFA). By patenting "matographs," a new photographic process, Danuser pursued the goal of being able to "process [a] substrate with color according to [his] ideas before coating it with a photographic black-and-white emulsion (Sadkowsky 2018, 7), in contrast to commercially available photographic papers, which have a white layer support. Thus, at the turn from analog to digital photography, he succeeds in "introduce[ing] a new perspective, namely direct[ing] the photographer's gaze to the otherwise unnoticed background [of a photographic print]."(Folkers, 2018, 86). • The Party is over (1984/2016) • Matographs and Volcanoes (1996–2018) • AT Matographs (1997) • Matographs, part I (1993–1996)

• Delta (1990–1996)

• Illustration — Danuser, Akka Bakka, 2013, art-in-architecture project, Department of Health, canton of Zürich The Counting Out Rhymes project on the subject of Entscheidungsfindung – Decision taking (work in progress) involves video stations and art-in-architecture. Danuser is interested in the approaches and models used in taking decisions as a social and political instrument, ranging from mathematical theory to the practical counting-out rhymes of children. The rhymes – "a mixtum compositum of reason and imagination" – are as significant as mathematical formulae and physical laws inasmuch as they are grounded in “nonrational processes of taking decisions” and therefore reflect the fundamental structure of contemporary models of thought. • Joggeli (Nationale Suisse, Basel, 2014) • Akka Bakka (Zürich Department of Health, 2013) • Piff Paff Puff (Prime Tower, 2010–2012) • Insert-Du (2009) • Video installation (since 2008)

• Wildwechsel (1993)

• Illustration — Danuser, Erosion III – a floor installation, 2000–2006, 9 parts (III 1–III 9), photographs on baryta paper, each 150 x 140 cm, installation in the Kunsthaus Zürich (Böcklin hall). The Erosion Project (work in progress) conducts research into the erosion of natural and cultivated landscapes which takes the shape of a clear, reduced aesthetic. 'The project consists of three series: floor installations, Erosion I-VII (2000–2006); Modeling Erosion (2003–2007), created in collaboration with the ETH Zurich Institute of Geotechnical Engineering; and Landschaft in Bewegung/Moving Landscape (2008–), a collaboration with the ETHZ Laboratory of Inorganic Chemistry as part of the research project Farbe und Fotografie/Colour and Photography. Earlier works were seminal to the series, specifically Landschaften (1993–1996) and the art-in-architecture project Schiefertafel Beverin (2001). • Erosion I-VII (2000–2006) • Modeling Erosion (2003–2007) • Landschaft in Bewegung/Moving Landscape (since 2008)

• Landschaften (1993–1996) • Strangled Bodies (1995, 2001) • Schiefertafel Beverin (2000–2001)

1988 found Danuser for the first time showing the pictures in the Architekturgalerie Luzern under the title Partituren und Bilder (Scores and Pictures), which he had been commissioned to photograph by the Pritzker prizewinning architect Peter Zumthor in 1986–1988: the Atelier des Architekten (Architect's studio) in Haldenstein, the Schutzbauten über römischen Funden (protective pavilions above Roman finds) in Chur and the Kapelle Sogn Benedetg (Chapel of St. Benedict) in the Surselva region of Canton Graubünden. The artist-cum-photographer was given carte blanche by the architect. In his essay in the book Zumthor sehen. Bilder von Hans Danuser – Nachdenken über Architektur und Fotografie, Philip Ursprung, professor of contemporary art and architectural history, discusses the impact that Danuser's photographs in Partituren und Bilder exerted on the depiction of architecture in photography: “With his photographs of Sogn Benedetg, Danuser radically altered the conventions of architectural photography. Instead of neutral documentation, he was interested in personal interpretation. And instead of reducing the phenomenon to a photograph, he as it were dismantled the building into its component parts, like a short film, which breaks the subject down into sequences and shows it from different perspectives; today one would call this performative. These fragments offer the observer the opportunity to reconstruct the building in the imagination.” • Partituren und Bilder. Architektonische Arbeiten aus dem Atelier Peter Zumthor (1985–1988) (Score and Pictures. Architectural work from the studio of Peter Zumthor) • Peter Zumthor, Therme Vals, in Zusammenarbeit mit Fritz Hauser, Sounding Stones Therme Vals (1996) (Peter Zumthor, Vals Thermal Baths, in collaboration with Fritz Hauser, Sounding Stones Vals Thermal Baths) • Zumthor sehen. Bilder von Hans Danuser (2009) (Looking at Zumthor, Pictures by Danuser)

• Illustration — Danuser, In Vivo, 1980–1989, Chemie I (VI 1), photographs on baryta paper, 50 x 40 cm. Settings: pharmacology and chemistry research, analysis and production facilities. Danuser worked for ten years on seven series of images, which he compiled in 1989 under the title In Vivo and presented to the public for the first time at the Kunstmuseum Aarau; the exhibition was curated by Beat Wismer. Taken in Europe and the US, the photographs in In Vivo are arranged in seven sections: A-Energie, Medizin I, Gold, Medizin II, Chemie I, Los Alamos, Chemie II (Nuclear Energy, Medicine I, Gold, Medicine II, Chemistry I, Los Alamos, Chemistry II). Depicting a variety of workplaces in research and production facilities, the work affords insights into taboo areas of late-industrial Western society without showing the people themselves. The images gauge the ambivalence of photography between documentation and fiction. The work has appeared in a book published by Lars Müller in 1989, also titled In Vivo. • In Vivo (1980–1989), 93 black-and-white photographs

• 1985: Kunstmuseum Graubünden, Chur ("Drei Fotoserien") • 1986: Gewerbemuseum Basel ("Drei Fotoserien") • 1986: Photoforum PasquArt, Biel • 1988: Architekturgalerie, Lucerne ("Partituren und Bilder. Architektonische Arbeiten aus dem Atelier Peter Zumthor 1985–1988") • 1989: Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau ("In Vivo") • 1990: Curt Marcus Gallery, New York ("Photographs") • 1991: Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich ("In Vivo") • 1993: Bündner Kunstmuseum, Chur ("Wildwechsel") • 1996: Kunsthaus Zürich, Zürich ("Delta. Photographs 1990–1996") • 1998: Kunstmuseum Nidwalden, Stans ("AT") • 1999: Walter Merian Haus, Basel ("Nah und Fern") • 2001: Fotomuseum Winterthur, Winterthur ("Frost") • 2003: Scalo Galerie, New York ("Frozen") • 2003: Galerie Luciano Fasciati, Chur ("Modeling Erosion") • 2005: Villa Garbald, Castasegna ("Projekt Garbald") • 2006: Moscow House of Photography, Big Manesh, Moscow ("Erosion") • 2008: Galerie Luciano Fasciati, Chur ("Auszählen – The Counting Out Rhymes Project") • 2009: Galerie Luciano Fasciati, Chur ("Nachdenken über Fotografie und Architektur") • 2012: Semper Sternwarte, ETH Zurich ("Ein Colloquium der Dinge") • 2014: Municipio Bregaglia, Promontogno ("Uccelin gion fond dal mer")

• 1987: Canton Graubünden Recognition Award for Visual Arts • 1992: Manor Kunstpreis • 1996: Conrad Ferdinand Meyer Prize for Young Art • 2001: Canton Graubünden Culture Prize

• 1974, 1976, 1983, 1985: Federal art stipend/Swiss Art Award • 1979, 1983, 1985: Study and work grants from Canton of Zürich • 1985: Art stipend for a residency at the City of Zürich studio in New York • 1983, 1984, 1985: Art stipend from the City of Zürich • 1991: Art stipend for a residency at the Landis & Gyr Foundation studio in London • 1996: Artist in Residence at Los Alamos Laboratories, New Mexico, USA