WILHELM FRIEDRICH BURGER (1882-1964)
The Weisshorn (4, 506m - 14, 783ft)
Switzerland (Valais)
In The Weisshorn from Zermatt, pencil on paper, John Mitchell Gallery, London
The mountain
The Weisshorn (4, 506m - 14, 783ft) meaning white peak in German ) is a major peak of the Swiss Alps. It is part of the Pennine Alps and is located between the valleys of Anniviers and Zermatt in the canton of Valais. The Weisshorn was first climbed in 1861 from Randa by the Irish physicist John Tyndall, accompanied by the guides J.J. Bennen and Ulrich Wenger. Nowadays, the Weisshorn Hut is used on the normal route. The Weisshorn is considered by many mountaineers to be the most beautiful mountain in the Alps and Switzerland for its pyramidal shape and pure white slopes.
In April and May 1991, two consecutive rockslides took place from a cliff above the town of Randa on the east side of the massif, below the Bis Glacier.
The artist
One of the leading graphic artists of his time, Wilhelm, or Willy, Burger is widely recognized today for his lithographed posters. Some of these placards now sell for more than his oils and watercolours! However, he was first and foremost a painter by training. He apprenticed in Zurich before leaving for Philadelphia and New York in 1908. After working there for several years, he returned to Zurich from where he would travel throughout the Swiss Alps, the Mediterranean and even Egypt for his commissions. This lofty panorama was painted in 1933 from the best known viewpoint of the monumental peak that straddles the French and Italian borders. Burger’s watercolour skills come to the fore in his rendering of the shadows reaching down the rocks to the Bergschrund above the Glacier du Géant; the small blob of undiluted ultramarine blue in the centre of Burger’s composition conjures the ice and late afternoon cold.
