Max Gubler

Max Gubler (born Zürich, May 26, 1898, died Zürich July 29, 1973) was a Swiss artist.

Early life and education

Max Gubler was born in Zürich-Aussersihl to Heinrich Eduard Gubler, a stage painter and restorer of wall paintings and Berta Gubler-Plüss. He had two older brothers named Eduard (1891–1971) and Ernst (1895–1958) who were both artists as well.

In 1905, Gubler’s father was commissioned to restore the frescoes of the pilgrimage church in Riedertal in the Canton of Uri, and the family spent their annual summer holidays there.

In 1914 Gubler began studying in Kantonsschule Küsnacht teachers’ college to become a primary school teacher, but dropped out in 1918 to work as an independent artist.

Career

Max Gubler moved to Berlin in 1920. From 1923 to 1927 he lived mostly on the island of Lipari, where he painted many pictures. From 1930 to 1937 he lived in Paris, before returning to Zürich.

He experimented with various contemporary styles, until developing his own personal vivid style of landscape painting on Lipari. Later he turned to abstraction, but continued to use bright colours. In 1956 he did a series of pastel illustrations for Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. In his late works, darker colours predominate.

His work was shown in many galleries. There were exhibitions of his works at the Lehnbachhaus in Munich in 1963 and the Kunstmuseum Bern in 1969. After his death a retrospective was held at the Kunsthaus Zurich in 1975.