Visual arts
Jean Tinguely
Jean Tinguely (1925-1991), a Swiss sculptor born in Fribourg, is one of the masters of kinetic art, famous for his moving machines. His link with Montreux runs through the poster: in 1982 he created the first Montreux Jazz Festival poster conceived as a work of art, whose lettering would give rise to the festival’s logo. Three years later he also designed the poster for the 25th Rose d’Or of Montreux.
Jean Tinguely, the artist of the Montreux posters
“Draw me a festival” (1982)
In 1982, Pierre Keller, then in charge of the Montreux Jazz Festival posters before heading the ECAL, said to his friend Jean Tinguely: “Draw me a festival.” The Fribourg artist sketched a firework. It was, Keller would write, a resounding success.
That poster launched a radical line: each edition’s poster would no longer be a marketing product but a work of art, screen-printed, always in the 70 × 100 cm format, without the musicians’ names or the sponsors’ logos. The lettering drawn by Tinguely, reworked by Keller and his students, is said to have given rise to the festival’s logo. The way was open for Keith Haring (1983), Andy Warhol, Niki de Saint Phalle and Max Bill (Le Temps).
The Rose d’Or poster (1985)
In 1985 Tinguely also designed the poster of the 25th Rose d’Or, Montreux’s other great television festival: a red rose set on a playing card, surrounded by a butterfly, a tortoise and a bear cub, with his scrawled hand “25ième Rose d’Or Montreux 85”.
