Couteaux suisses (2024)

n° 280 | Couteaux suisses | 12x12x36 cm | 2024

Eric Bossard was born in Geneva in 1954. After completing his studies in physiotherapy (Geneva) and ethnology (University of Neuchâtel), he spent seven years in Africa with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), UNICEF and as an independent ethnologist. He is currently working part-time as an artist.

The street and our society of over-consumption are the prime focus of Eric Bossard’s works and in fact furnish the “raw material” for his collages and acrylic inclusions. This includes things destined for the dustbin or for recycling (advertisements, leaflets and other waste dropped in the streets) and objects no longer needed and offered for sale in flea markets.

For these abandoned objects which no longer serve their original purpose, Bossard creates new roles, giving a metaphorical meaning to things that have lost their original value. He bestows on them a second life. A kind of artistic upcycling process that highlights the fact that our waste mirrors our consumer society. An image that we tend to prefer to ignore.