Emma Kunz
Independent 20th Century New York
24 – 27 September
Stand 401
For our first presentation at Independent 20th Century, Hauser & Wirth is delighted to announce a solo exhibition of important works on paper by the late Swiss visionary Emma Kunz (1892 – 1963). On view will be a rare grouping of nine intricate geometric compositions that together capture the brilliance of an artist, researcher, poet and healer who numbers among the last century’s most singular creative forces.
Untitled (Work No. 074)
Undated
Untitled (Work No. 408)
Undated
Untitled (Work No. 503)
Undated
Untitled (Work No. 515)
Undated
Portrait of Emma Kunz (1892 – 1963) © Emma Kunz Foundation. Courtesy Emma Kunz Centre
About the artist
Emma Kunz (1892 – 1963) was a Swiss artist, researcher and healer whose intricate geometric drawings explore the relationship between nature, energy fields and human consciousness. Kunz considered herself first and foremost a researcher, using her drawings to investigate the underlying principles she believed governed people, nature and the wider world. Produced using graph paper, colored pencil and a pendulum-guided method, the drawings served as tools for diagnosis, reflection and inquiry within her therapeutic practice. They enabled her to identify relationships and possible causes of illness, from which she developed paths toward healing, grounded in her understanding of the human being as an integrated whole of body, mind and spirit. The drawings were therefore both the outcome of Kunz’s research and an essential component of her healing practice. Although she did not identify as an artist during her lifetime, Kunz is now recognized as a pioneering figure whose interdisciplinary practice anticipated many contemporary concerns around spirituality, ecology and holistic systems of knowledge.
Today, her legacy is preserved by the Emma Kunz Foundation and the Emma Kunz Centre in Würenlos, Switzerland, which houses the largest collection of her work and supports ongoing research into her practice. Since the 1970s, Kunz’s work has been the subject of major institutional exhibitions internationally, with a renewed attention to her practice in recent decades, including ‘3xAbstraction,’ at The Drawing Center, New York NY (2005), where her work was presented alongside Hilma af Klint and Agnes Martin; ‘Weltempfänger: Georgiana Houghton – Hilma af Klint – Emma Kunz’ at Lenbachhaus, Munich, Germany (2018); ‘Emma Kunz: Visionary Drawings’ at Serpentine Galleries, London, UK (2019), the first major UK solo exhibition of her work; ‘Emma Kunz: Visionary Drawings’ at Muzeum Susch, Susch, Switzerland (2019), further underscoring the enduring relevance of her practice; and ‘Emma Kunz Cosmos’ at Aargauer Kunsthaus, Aarau, Switzerland (2021).