Alois Carigiet

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Carigiet murals on the Catholic Church in Vella, Switzerland, depicting Saint Christopher and Saint Maurice (1940)

Alois Carigiet (30 August 1902 – 1 August 1985) was a

Hans Christian Andersen Medal for children's illustrators.[1][2]

Biography

Early life and education (1902–1923)

Alois Carigiet was the seventh of eleven children born to Alois Carigiet and Barbara Maria Carigiet, née Lombriser; the actor and comedian

Graubünden, where he grew up and spent his first school years. At home, the family spoke Sursilvan, the local Romansh dialect of the anterior Rhine valley.[3] In 1911, economic hardship forced them to move to the canton's German-speaking capital Chur where his father found employment. This relocation into a more urban environment had a strong impact on the nine-year-old. In retrospect, Carigiet described the move as an "emigration to the low-lands", from a "mountain boy's paradise" to a "gloomy apartment on the ground floor in a narrow town alley".[4]

Carigiet visited primary and secondary schools in Chur, as well as the "Kantonsschule", the canton's

decorative art in Räth's atelier, Carigiet spent a lot of his spare time filling volumes of sketchbooks with drawings of rural and urban scenes, farm animals and pets, anatomical studies of heads and beaks of the birds exhibited at Chur's natural history museum, as well as with numerous caricatures of his acquaintances and family. Räth noticed the apprentice's talent as well, and one of Carigiet's appointed creations, an assembly of decorated vases for the Siebler & Co. shop windows, seems to have received particular appreciation. Carigiet finished his apprenticeship in 1923, with the highest grade in every subject.[5]

Graphic design in Zürich (1923–1939)

After having completed his apprenticeship, Carigiet sought work in

Paris International world fair in 1937, and set designs, murals and the official posters for the "Landi", the Swiss national exposition held in Zürich in 1939.[7]

Artistic development

Though he had never studied visual arts in the academic sense, Carigiet's early graphic design was already strongly influenced by contemporary artists, such as

watercolor) and of Ascona in Haus und Garten in Ascona (oil painting on cardboard), both created in 1935. Contemporary expressionism had an influence on his work as well, including his commercial artwork. For example, the display of red horses and a green cow on posters for the OLMA
, Switzerland’s annual national agricultural fair, in 1946 and 1952 received acclaim from art critics and questions from more conservative farmers, to which he succinctly replied that the cow was green because it had eaten grass. Carigiet's paintings increasingly depicted everyday motifs from his home canton Graubünden and occasionally Zürich, but also from further trips to France, Spain, and
Lapland in the mid-1930s.[9]

Carigiet always held a keen interest in the theatre, and had already worked in

gherkin) with a carrot-nose, and from 1935 to 1946 he created often parodistic costume and set designs for ten of the Cornichon’s programs, including a heavily decorated barrel organ used by his brother Zarli who was also a member of the Cabaret's ensemble.[10][11]

Platenga (1939 – 1950)

While spending a holiday in Trun in May 1939, Carigiet hiked to "Platenga", a hamlet on one of the terraces in the community of Obersaxen, where, in his own words, he was immediately fascinated by the landscape's vastness and untouchedness and the feeling of a newly found, long lost paradise.[12] He gave up his business in Zürich, and, in October 1939, rented a small farm house without electricity or running water, the "Hüs am Bach" ("house at the creek") in Platenga. Carigiet wished to dedicate his life to art and observation, spending hours a day, equipped with a pair of binoculars and a sketch book, tracking down the alpine fauna.[13]

On 20 April 1943, Carigiet married Berta Carolina Müller (1911–1980) an art student from

Halle whom he had met in Germany. After their first daughter was born in 1944, they bought land near Platenga's chapel. In 1945 Carigiet designed plans for a larger house which was built in 1946. In 1947, the second daughter was born in the new house, called "Im Sunnefang". Mainly for the sake of the girls' education, the family moved back to Zürich in 1950, where Carigiet took up his work as a graphic designer again, while also continuing his artistic pursuits.[14]

Children's books

In 1940, Carigiet was approached by the

trychel for the annual Chalandamarz celebration on 1 March. The book has been translated into ten languages with total sales estimated around 1.7 million worldwide.[15] Carigiet's dramatic and colorful compositions were noticed and positively reviewed by art critics including Manuel Gasser in Graphis Inc. or Linus Birchler, editor-in-chief of the series Art Monuments of Switzerland
and member of the Swiss Federal Art Commission.

Carigiet and Chönz created a series of Alpine children's books with two sequels featuring Ursli's younger sister: Flurina (Flurina und das Wildvögelein. Schellen-Ursli's Schwester) in 1952 (English title: Florina and the Wild Bird) and La naivera (Der grosse Schnee) in 1957 (The Snowstorm). In the 1960s, Carigiet continued on his own, illustrating and writing Zottel, Zick und Zwerg. Eine Geschichte von drei Geissen in 1965 (Anton the Goatherd), Birnbaum, Birke, Berberitze. Eine Geschichte aus den Bündner Bergen in 1967 (The Pear Tree, the Birch Tree and the Barberry Bush), and Maurus und Madleina. Über den Berg in die Stadt in 1969 (Anton and Anne). In 1966, he was awarded the Schweizer Jugendbuchpreis (Swiss youth book prize) for Zottel, Zick und Zwerg.[16]

The biennial Hans Christian Andersen Award, conferred by the International Board on Books for Young People and first awarded in 1956, is the highest recognition available to a writer or illustrator of children's books. Carigiet received the inaugural Illustrator award in 1966.[1][2]

Later life (1960 – 1985)

In 1960, Carigiet bought the house "Flutginas" (ferns) located above Trun, his village of childhood, where he would spend the rest of his life dedicated to painting. In a speech held in Zürich in 1962, he described his works as "narrative art" in a century of abstraction, and named

Frankfurt (1971). Alois Carigiet died on 1 August 1985 in Trun.[18][19]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Hans Christian Andersen Awards". International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY). Retrieved 2013-08-03.
  2. ^ a b "Alois Carigiet" (pp. 34–35, by Eva Glistrup).
    The Hans Christian Andersen Awards, 1956–2002. IBBY. Gyldendal. 2002. Hosted by Austrian Literature Online. Retrieved 2013-08-03.
  3. ^ Hansjakob Diggelmann, "Alois Carigiet: Leben und Werk", Von Arx & Schnyder (1992), p. 8.
  4. ^ Stutzer, p. 8.
  5. ^ Stutzer, pp. 8–9.
  6. ^ Stutzer, p. 10–13.
  7. ^ Stutzer, p. 20.
  8. ^ Therese Bhattacharya-Stettler, "Alois Carigiet als Gebrauchsgraphiker", Von Arx & Schnyder (1992), p. 68.
  9. ^ Stutzer, pp. 18–19.
  10. ^ Stutzer, pp. 14–15.
  11. ^ Diggelmann, p. 9.
  12. ^ Stutzer, p. 22.
  13. ^ Stutzer, pp. 24–25.
  14. ^ Stutzer, pp. 25–31.
  15. ^ Stutzer, p. 32–34.
  16. ^ Stutzer, pp. 32–34.
  17. ^ Alois Carigiet, "Alois Carigiet über sich selbst – Auszüge aus einer Rede", Von Arx & Schnyder (1992), p. 140.
  18. ^ Stutzer, pp. 50–52.
  19. ^ Diggelmann, p. 14.
Citations
  • Beat Stutzer. Carigiet. Die frühen Jahre. Pages 8–54. 2002: AS Verlag & Buchkonzept AG, Zürich und München –
    ISBN 3-905111-73-X
  • Heinz von Arx, Peter Schnyder (editors). Alois Carigiet. 1992: AS Buchkonzept AG, Zürich –
    ISBN 3-905111-02-0

External links
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