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On the trail of Anne-Marie Fischer’s art

Susanna Koeberle · Journalist and Author

Studios are interesting places in many respects: What an unfamiliar visitor finds there provides a trail of clues, so to speak, as to how a work is to be understood. In conversation with the artist Anne-Marie Fischer, I follow this trail and embark on an expedition into her artistic universe. One initially obvious clue presents itself when I see two completed paintings hanging on a wall in the artist’s brightly lit studio. In art, however, one should be wary of the apparent. Indeed, that is also indicated by these works’ lines and forms, which are sometimes clear and sometimes blurred. The brain searches for something to hold onto, for a way of decoding the abstract forms that appear before the eye.

Behind the clarity of the geometric-looking compositions, the observer also senses a searching movement. A meandering in the space, causing fixed coordinates to sway. This impression is enhanced by the works’ fragmentary structure. On closer inspection, I discover different layers and materials. As I follow the trail of materiality, Fischer tells me about the genesis of her artworks: how she initially establishes the right balance between strips of paper by means of collage. Only when this balance has been found, is the work then converted (or translated, as she calls it) into another medium.

Her oeuvre in general seems to be very much about translation processes and transfers. For instance, when this artist was drawing inspiration from her memory of a landscape in Norway, it was not until quite some time after her journey that she found an appropriate format and manner of artistic expression for it. The resulting works lie in one of the drawers that the artist opens for me. In these places hidden from the light, entire worlds open up. On the shelf opposite, there are material samples and enigmatic objects collected by the artist. When she opens the boxes stowed inside, the contents are shown to include beautiful textiles that Fischer brought back to Zurich from a trip to Japan. Their colours and textures fascinate her. She says that they might soon become part of a new artwork.

Fischer works in series. The step-by-step development of her artworks is an essential aspect that is also reflected in this encountered collection of (still) disparate elements. The materials provide a trail of clues. They are future promises of something emerging, which is yet to be seen. Although they find a new home in Fischer’s works, they nevertheless remain in motion. The materials found in the studio are in a process of transformation. By transferring them to art, the artist recharges them. As she does so, her medium comprises not only the brush or the palette knife, but also her body and her thoughts. In Fischer’s studio, one encounters not only material clues, but also the traces of her intellectual investigation into the essence of things.