Fire ("Flammehuus", flame house)

History of the work

At the entrance of a classroom pavilion at the Bethlehemacker school, a picture is painted directly onto the brickwork; the City of Bern lists it under the title 'Feuer' (Fire). The building carries the Bernese German name 'Flammehuus' (flame house). According to the city's records the picture is by Walter Linck and dates from 1959.

According to the city's building inventory, the school was built in three stages between 1952 and 1959 to designs by the architects Oskar and Claire Rufer. The site had already been reserved for a school in the 1943 development plan. The last stage, of 1959, falls in the same year as this picture. The five similar pavilions with shallow gabled roofs are set out in a fan around a shared playground.

The city states that Walter Linck and his wife, the ceramicist Margrit Linck-Daepp, were responsible for the artistic design of the buildings. At the entrances of the wings at Kornweg 101 to 107 the four elements, earth, air, water and fire, appear in abstracted form. The original furnishings also include a playful fountain in the courtyard, which the city compares to the machines of Jean Tinguely.

Linck, born in Bern in 1903 as the son of the painter Ernst Linck, was above all a sculptor. According to the Historical Dictionary of Switzerland he destroyed his earlier work in 1943 and afterwards worked in metal; he became known for moving constructions of wire and spring steel. In the year of this mural he was invited to documenta II in Kassel. He died in 1975.

During the complete renovation and extension planned by Meier Leder Architekten of Baden, the element pictures and the fountain were restored true to the original, according to the city's building department. The building inventory points to a detail worth checking on site: tall trees mark the entrances of the pavilions.

Researched and summarised by Bärn Kit. Sources: Kultur Stadt Bern, Kunst im öffentlichen Raum (offene Daten) · Hochbau Stadt Bern: Kunst und Bau Volksschule Bethlehemacker (2024) · Bauinventar Stadt Bern: Baugruppe Schulhaus Bethlehemacker · HLS: Walter Linck · SIKART: Walter Linck (Michael Baumgartner) · Wikipedia (de): Walter Linck · Wikimedia Commons: Wandmalerei Feuer (Walter Link 1959)