784 - Willy Friedrich Burger, poster design *The Couple*

Willy Friedrich Burger, poster design *The Couple* Rear view of a couple embracing, charcoal and yellow chalk on paper, mid-20th century, ligated monogram ‘WFB’ in the bottom left-hand corner, minor imperfections, image dimensions approx. 86.5 x 65 cm, sheet dimensions approx. 98 x 75 cm. Artist’s biography: born Wilhelm Friedrich Burger, Swiss painter, draughtsman, graphic artist, illustrator and poster artist (1882, Zurich - 1964, Rüschlikon); initially trained as a lithographer, subsequently a student at the Zurich School of Applied Arts, 1901-02: studied at the Karlsruhe Academy under Ludwig Schmid-Reutte; 1903-05: worked as a graphic artist in London, whilst also studying at the Royal Academy; 1906: returned to Switzerland; finally, 1906-08: worked as an illustrator and graphic artist in New York, Philadelphia and Boston; from 1909 in Rome and Florence; returned to Switzerland in 1913 and worked in Rüschlikon as a landscape painter, illustrator and poster artist; undertook various study trips, such as to Italy in 1921, to Spain in 1925 and 1926, to Morocco in 1934, to Egypt and Palestine (Jerusalem) in 1935, as well as to Algeria and the south of France; submitted works to, amongst others, the World’s Fairs in Milan (1906) and Brussels (1910), where he was awarded a silver medal and a gold medal; he worked in Rüschlikon, Canton of Zurich, and was a citizen of Zurich; Source: Vollmer, AKL, Saur’s ‘Bio-Bibliographical Encyclopaedia of Artists’, Sikart, Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, Huber-Frauenfeld and Wikipedia.