Morel, Bertha
untitled
Bertha Morel, untitled, between 1936 and 1960, graphite on paper, 16 x 37,5 cm, photo : Marie Humair, Atelier de numérisation – Ville de Lausanne, Collection de l’Art Brut, Lausanne
Author
Morel, Bertha,
(1891-1968), Switzerland
Biography
Bertha Morel (1891–1968), the last of nine children, was born in Montricher, in the canton of Vaud, Switzerland. She was committed to the Cery psychiatric hospital at the age of sixty-six and appears to have been a patient of Dr Hans Steck. Dr Steck donated her works to the Collection de l’Art Brut in 1980, along with many others collected at Cery. While at the hospital, Morel was extremely active creatively. She wrote, drew, and embroidered on a wide range of materials, mostly salvaged, such as paper used for wrapping food and fabric offcuts. In both her drawings and embroideries, she used graphite to combine fine geometric and abstract motifs with frontal and profile portraits of women. She would use the same medium to make preparatory drawings on pieces of fabric she was about to embroider. The embroideries themselves are made with red or white thread, or with small, irregularly shaped pieces of fabric.
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