Female Torso

History of the work

East of the crematorium, in section B5 of the Bremgarten cemetery, stands a bronze 'Frauentorso' (female torso) by Hermann Hubacher. The city's register dates it to 1943. A torso shows the body without its head or limbs complete; which parts are missing here and how large the figure is, the available sources do not say. We also found nothing about the commission or installation.

Hubacher was born in Biel on 1 August 1885 and died in Zurich on 18 November 1976. At the Technikum in Biel he trained as an engraver and medallist, then attended courses in Geneva and at the academy in Vienna. With the Geneva sculptor James Vibert he met Ferdinand Hodler, and later Adolf von Hildebrand. From 1910 he had his own studio in Bern; he moved to Zurich in 1916 according to the Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, or in 1917 according to SIKART. A long friendship linked him to the Winterthur collector Oskar Reinhart.

SIKART names the free-standing female nude as his main subject besides the portrait bust. The Historical Dictionary also counts grave figures among his work. Hubacher received the international sculpture prize at the Venice Biennale in 1938, the art prize of the City of Zurich in 1944 and an honorary doctorate from the University of Zurich in 1945. In Bern his works include the fountain figure 'Badende' (Bather) of 1923 on the terrace by the Federal Palace.

The Bremgarten cemetery is the oldest of Bern's present cemeteries; it opened in 1864, and the crematorium near this spot in 1908. When visiting the torso, you can compare it with the 'Badende' by the Federal Palace, made twenty years earlier.

Researched and summarised by Bärn Kit. Sources: Stadt Bern: Kunstwerke im öffentlichen Raum (opendata.swiss) · HLS: Hermann Hubacher · SIKART: Hermann Hubacher · Stadtgrün Bern: Der Bremgartenfriedhof – Ein Spaziergang mit Geschichten (2023) · Wikipedia (de): Bremgartenfriedhof · Wikimedia Commons: Foto