Water ("Wällehuus", wave house)

History of the work

The pavilion with the Bernese German name 'Wällehuus' (wave house) at the Bethlehemacker school has a mural on brick at its entrance. The City of Bern lists it under the title 'Wasser' (Water), names Walter Linck as its author and dates it to 1953. It belongs to a series of pictures of the four elements at the entrances of the classroom wings at Kornweg 101 to 107.

According to the city's building inventory, the architect couple Oskar and Claire Rufer designed the complex, which was built in three stages from 1952 to 1959. The first stage comprised two identical classroom wings, a service wing with special rooms and the caretaker's flat, and a gymnasium that gave way to a new building in 1968/69. The picture of 1953 therefore dates from the school's early years. In front of each entrance is a porch with a rhomboid plan.

According to the city's building department, Walter Linck and Margrit Linck-Daepp were responsible for the artistic furnishing. The elements are shown in abstracted form, not as narrative scenes. According to the city, the original design also includes a fountain in the courtyard.

Linck had attended the trade school in Bern, the metalwork class in Zurich and then the academy in Berlin. According to the artists' lexicon SIKART, in 1943 he sank almost all of his sculptural work in the Aare and started afresh. In the year of this mural the Galerie Marbach in Bern showed his first solo exhibition; in 1954 and 1955, SIKART says, he designed moving water features and fountains. From 1941 he lived in Reichenbach near Bern, where he died in 1975.

The school has recently been completely renovated and extended with a new building. In the process, the city says, the pictures at the entrances and the fountain were restored true to the original. Walking from pavilion to pavilion, you can compare the four elements with one another.

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 · SIKART: Walter Linck (Michael Baumgartner) · HLS: Walter Linck · Wikipedia (de): Walter Linck · Wikimedia Commons: Wandmalerei Wasser (Walter Link 1953)