Hans Coray 1906–1991

Hans Coray was born in Zürich in 1906 and studied romance languages, receiving his doctorate in the field in 1929. Coray was also interested in arts and design and established himself the following year as a furniture designer in Zürich. He is most famous for his 1938 Landi chair, an all-aluminum stacking chair that debuted as the official seating for the grounds at the Swiss National Exhibition of 1939. Landi was the first design of Coray’s to be put into production, after he had spent much of the 1930s experimenting with the use of sheet metal and industrial processes of production.

Coray was also associated with the Art Concret movement, founded by Theo van Doesburg in 1930 and continued after his death in 1931 by artists such as Hans Fischli and Max Bill. Art Concret focused on art being universal, anti-impressionistic and without “lyricism, drama, symbolism and so on.” These maxims guided Coray in creating works of collective appeal, functionality and simplicity. In the 1950s, Coray returned to figurative art and passed away in 1991 in his native Zürich.