ZURICH.- The Museum Rietberg is presenting one of the most unusual and as yet little known Swiss artists of the twentieth century: Alice Boner (1889–1981) spent more than forty years of her life in the Indian city Varanasi, where she worked as an artist, patron, collector and art historian, as well as acting as a cultural ambassador with a wide range of interests.

The project provides fascinating insight into the many-faceted and eventful life of a headstrong, unconventional and courageous woman who was at home in two cultures. Traces of her unusual story reverberate throughout the Museum Rietberg, in Zurich and in India.

The Swiss artist has been closely associated with the Museum Rietberg for ages. She lived in the Park Villa Rieter from 1913 to 1919; afterwards she was active in the artistic circles of Zurich and Paris; and in 1935 she emigrated to Varanasi in India.

With her interest and her dedication, with her art, her publications and her collboration with various artists, Alice Boner changed and promoted the understanding and awareness of Indian art throughout the world. Together with Uday Shankar, she contributed significantly to the renaissance and ongoing development of Indian dance.

Boner's close association with the Museum Rietberg led to the generous donation of her collection of Indian sculptures and miniatures. The most beautiful of the miniatures will be shown in their own exhibition in the Park Villa Rieter.

The exhibition is an in-house production and encompasses photographs, sketches, drawings, paintings and sculptures, as well as extracts from her diaries, her correspondence and her manuscripts. It marks at the same time the conclusion of the Alice Boner Archive Project at the Museum Rietberg, started in 2010, which in seven years has documented and edited her entire bequest.

After the exhibition with the title Alice from Switzerland – A Visionary Artist and Scholar Across Two Continents – curated by Andrea Kuratli and Johannes Beltz – was shown in Mumbai (CSMVS, from November 2014 to February 2015) and in New Delhi (National Museum, from September to October 2016), it will now be shown in the Museum Rietberg.

Alice Boner in India – A Life for Art is arranged chronologically and includes the many facets of the artist's work and interests.

It extends from the exhibition rooms in the main building Smaragd [Emerald] to the Villa Wesendonck, where masterpieces from her collection of Indian sculptures are exhibited. A selection of her most beautiful Indian miniatures is exhibited in the Park-Villa Rieter, where she lived from 1913 to 1919.

In addition, her works can be seen in the Rieterpark and in other locations in Zurich and Baden.

The exhibits come mainly from her bequest, kept in the Alice Boner Archives at the Museum Rietberg.