The life and art of an outstanding artist of the 20th century.
Sophie Taeuber-Arp is a pioneer of modern art. She was at the centre of Zu¨rcherDada and is considered the most important Swiss artist at the beginning of the twentieth century.
She was a dancer, painter, sculptor, textile artist, designer and interior designer.She made paper, textiles, wood and glass glow - she bound light to matter inpaintings, jewellery, embroidery, carpets, marionettes, furniture and sculptures.This unique portrait shows how Sophie passionately devoted herself to her art despite the threat of two world wars. Through her work, she not only found and maintained her inner self and joy under extremely difficult circumstances, but also drew great strength from it to survive, withstand the challenges and remain true to herself.
The author, Silvia Boadella, is Sophie Taeuber-Arp's grandniece and grew up with her life's work. She is able to draw on her family's memories, stories and documents, as well as previously unpublished sources, with an intimate and empathetic approach, as if she were seeing the world directly through Sophie's eyes. She succeeds in creating a narrative with powerful words and images, which for the first time connects stations from Sophie's life with her works. With many carefully selected illustrations and photographs from the family archive, she turns her narrative into a vivid experience. Fundamental themes such as love, birth and death, which are of central importance to every human life, have been woven into the text by the author in order to stimulate direct emotional access to Sophie's works and to enable the reader to engage creatively with them and to feel how the artist lives on in her art.