The renowned Swiss artist H.R. Giger has died at the age of 74

The renowned Swiss artist H.R. Giger has died at the age of 74, as a result of injuries sustained in a fall. Giger, who passed away in a Zurich hospital, was most famous for the alien monster he created for the movie of the same name. The terrifying creature and sets he created for Ridley Scott’s film earned him an Oscar for special effects in 1980. In the art world, Giger is appreciated for his wide body of work in the fantastic realism and surrealistic genres.
His talent for scaring movie audiences was repeated in Poltergeist 2 (1986), Alien 3 (1992) and Species (1995). Computer game fans were able to enjoy his work in Dark Seed in 1995.

Film work was just one of his talents. Giger is also known for his sculptures, paintings and furniture. The H.R. Giger Museum, inaugurated in the summer of 1998 in the Château St. Germain, is a four-level building complex in the historic, medieval walled city of Gruyères. It is the permanent home to many of the artist’s most prominent works.

However his art is not for people with weak nerves. Critic Fritz Billeter once wrote that Giger’s work was “loaded with eroticism tending often towards the shocking and the sadistic” and sometimes taking the form of an “orgiastic cult”.

Giger’s so-called biomechanoids represent a large share of his work. His representations of these creatures is a mixture of human and mechanical parts, with a strong focus on sexuality that can be disturbing for the viewer.

These biomechanoids are to be seen in many of Giger’s paintings and drawings, but the theme is also common to his sculptures and furniture.

In a swissinfo.ch report to mark Giger’s 70th birthday, Tobia Bezzola, curator of Zurich’s fine arts museum, said he appreciated Giger and worked with him on two exhibitions at the museum in 1995 and 2005. Bezzola said he particularly enjoyed the artist’s acid view of society that occasionally led him to blasphemous outbursts.

“Giger is for me one of the most important Swiss artists of the second half of the 20th century,” said Bezzola.

He pointed out the artist’s use of film and other art forms that helped people sharpen their visual perception. He also believed that Giger should be as highly rated as Swiss giants such as the architect Le Corbusier or fellow artist Max Bill.

Work for recording artists

Celtic Frost: To Mega Therion

Magma: Attahk

Emerson, Lake & Palmer: Brain Salad Surgery (1973)

Steve Stevens’ Atomic Playboys

Mylène Farmer: Mylenium Tour (1999, sculpture of Isis on stage)

Deborah Harry, portraits for Koo Koo album cover and videos “Backfired” and “Now I Know You Know” (1981)

Clepsydra: Hologram (1991, holographed sculpture for the cover)

hide: Hide Your Face

Carcass: Heartwork

Danzig: Danzig III: How the Gods Kill

Dead Kennedys’ album Frankenchrist, Poster insert of Landscape XX (which led to an obscenity trial)

Atrocity – Hallucinations

Black Sun Productions

Island: Pictures

SHINE– Inthecentre (1996, tonal compositions of H. R. Giger pictures by Schahram Poursoudmand / Lichtschrei)

Korn’s Jonathan Davis commissioned Giger to design and sculpt a microphone stand, with the requirement that it be biomechanical, erotic, and movable. The contract allowed for five aluminium microphone stands to be made, but Davis purchased only two of the three to which he was entitled. The design of the microphone stand was later adapted to Giger’s “Nubian Queen”, transforming it into a fine art sculpture.

Designed the stage for Mylène Farmer’s 1999 “Mylenium” tour.

Blondie’s Chris Stein commissioned Lieber Guitars to create Stein’s unique “Gigerstein” guitar based roughly on Giger’s artwork, but without Giger’s direct involvement.

Helped to design the first professional video clip of “Böhse Onkelz” called “Dunkler Ort” (dark location) from their album “Ein böses Märchen … aus tausend finsteren Nächten”, which was released in 2000.

Ibanez Guitars has released second generation of H. R. Giger Signature Models hr giger RG & hr giger S series with legacy artwork on the guitar body, second generation of 4-string guitar bass SRXHRG1 also released with the same concept.

Triptykon: Eparistera Daimones

Triptykon: Melana Chasmata

Source: http://www.swissinfo.ch