Bruno Bischofberger

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Bruno Bischofberger (born 1940) is an art dealer and gallerist from Zurich, Switzerland.

In 1963 Bischofberger opened his first gallery in Zurich. In 1965 he help an exhibition of American pop artists including: Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Tom Wesselman and Claes Oldenburg. In 1968 “First right of refusal” contract with Andy Warhol which lasts until the artists death in 1987.

In 1969 Bischofberger co-founded Interview Magazine with Andy Warhol and 1970 produced Warhol's movie “L‘Amour“.

He commissions workseries from Warhol such as the „Maos“ [1] in 1971, the „Children Paintings“ in 1982 and the „Collaboration Paintings“ by Warhol Jean-Michel Basquiat and Francesco Clemente in 1984.

In the late 60s and early 70s, Bischofberger organized Pop-Art exhibitions, but also showed artists of the Nouveau Réalisme style such as Yves Klein and Jean Tinguely (later Bischofberger publishes Tinguelys Catalogue Raisonné). In 1966 he is the first to show works by Gerhard Richter outside of Germany.

In the 70s follow a series of one-man exhibitions and installations of Minimal and Conceptual artists: Dan Flavin, Donald Judd, On Kawara, Joseph Kosuth, Sol Lewitt, Bruce Nauman and others. Works by modern classics such as Picasso, Matisse and Léger are added to the gallery‘s program. From 1970 to 1977 Thomas Ammann works for Bischofberger both in his Zurich as well as St. Moritz gallery.

From 1979 on Bruno Bischofberger predominantly showed works by Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Julian Schnabel, David Salle, Francesco Clemente, Enzo Cucchi, Miquel Barceló, George Condo, Peter Halley and Mike Bidlo. In 1982 Bischofberger began to show Basquiat on an exclusive basis. Bischofberger's gallery publishes books on most of the above artists and is instrumental in organising exhibitions, Museum retrospectives, etc.. Today Bruno Bischofberger additionally represents the renowned contemporary architect and designer Ettore Sottsass. Since 1995 Bischofberger's gallery has being directed by Tobias Mueller [2] who is the only nephew of the late Thomas Ammann.