zermatt

HENI Editions and Fondation Beyeler are pleased to announce the release of six limited-edition Giclée prints on Cotton Smooth Rag with Peter Doig, based on his ‘Zermatt’ paintings from 2020 and 2021. Each print is framed in Oak with Optium Tru Vue Acrylic Glass. 

A collection that marks the artist’s first return to snowscapes since the 1990s, ‘Zermatt’ is also Doig’s first thematic group of works. The series was conceived in 2018, when Swiss architect and artist Heinz Julen offered Doig his chalet in the idyllic resort town as an artistic prompt to paint his surroundings.  

Compositionally and conceptually, Doig was inspired by ski posters designed to attract people to the mountains. Characterised by a delicate balance of dynamic skiers and majestic, snow-covered landscapes, simple yet enticing, the images prompted Doig to produce his own series of painted posters. As such, ‘Zermatt’ joins Doig’s history of making posters, including those made for his Studio Film Club in Trinidad. 

Relying largely on memory to construct images based on his experiences in Zermatt, Doig drew upon a range of inspirations – from the town’s strong religious tradition and the danger of its landscape, to memories of skiing and commuting to the slopes. His view of the resort town was undeniably influenced by Derek Walcott’s descriptions of Zermatt in his generative series of poems, ‘The Prodigal’ (2006). 

The six ‘Zermatt’ paintings deemed by Doig to be the most ‘poster-like’ in size and appearance have been translated here into facsimile prints. Originally conceived as a series of painted posters on paper, the ‘Zermatt’ paintings take on a new dimension as prints, bringing these images into the format that inspired them, to become, as Doig calls them, ‘art posters’.