MAX HUBER

(1919 - 1992)
Max Huber was born in Switzerland in 1919. When he turned 17, Huber enrolled at the Zurich School of Arts and Crafts where he was instructed by teachers Ernst Gubler, Gottlieb Wehrli, Heinri Mller, Walter Roshardt, Otto Weber and Alfred Willimann. Huber began his career as a graphic designer in 1935 at Conzett & Huber with Emil Schultness, Max Bill, and Hans Neuberg. At the start of the World War II in december 1940, to avoid being drafted in the Swiss Army, Huber moved to Milan and joined Studio Boggeri. However, when Italy entered the war in 1941 Huber returned to Switzerland and began collaboration with Werner Bischof and Emil Schultness for the art magazine Du. Between 1942 and 1944 he associated with the members of the Alliance Association of Modern Swiss Artists in Zurich, a group of modern Swiss artists led by Max Bill. His work was exhibited at the Kunsthaus Zurich museum along with Max Bill, Leo Leuppi, Richard Lohse and Camille Graeser. After the war, Huber returned to Milan and was appointed the creative director for the Italian publishing company Giulio Einaudi editore, by Einaudi. The job puts him in contact with the post-war Italian intelligentsia:Cesare Pavese, Natalia Ginzburg, Elio Vittorini, Franco Fortini, Ettore Sottsass, Achille Castiglioni and Albe Steiner. Along with Albe Steiner, he worked on the designs of record covers and music magazines for jazz events and artists such as Louis Armstrong. In 1948, Huber designed the iconic Autodrom Nazional di Monza Grad Prix poster. In 1950, Huber designed the corporate identity for the supermarket chain La Rinascente and along with Achille Castiglioni, installations for RAI, Eni, and Montecatini. He was awarded the prestigious Compasso doro (an Italian Industrial Design Award) in 1954, and in 1958 he traveled to the US as a speaker for the First International Seminar on Typography. In 1965, the Nippon Design Committee organizes an exhibition of his work at Matsuya Design Gallery in Tokyo where he met the illustrator Aoi Kono, who would become his wife. Huber had developed a style in which he mixed unframed photographic and typographic elements with strips of color to achieve a dynamic composition. He maintained a strict use of grids and demanded clarity and rhythm with distinct hierarchy. Huber spent the rest of his years teaching graphic design at Scuola Umanitaria, and at Scuola Politecnica di Design in Milan and finally at CSIA (Centro Scolastico Industrie Artistiche) in Lugano. In 1992 Max Huber died in Sagno, a small village on the Swiss-Italian border. m.a.x.museo, a museum dedicated to his name and work through the years, was opened in Chiasso, Switzerland in 2005.