VITA
The color games of the artist Kalchie:
full of longing, soul, and somnambulism
Kalchie was born in 1937 as Gisela Clara Schiel in Koblenz am Rhein and left Germany in 1959 to settle in Basel, her new home. Kalchie’s girlhood was shaped by two arts: she devoted herself to painting, and she was fascinated by the Koblenz City Theater. She felt comfortable in the world of the stage, dance, and magnificent sets, and at the age of 13, she even played the leading role in a children’s fairy tale. Even after her youth, alongside her bourgeois life as Schmid-Schiel with her husband and two children, Kalchie continued her painting with great creative enthusiasm and exhibited her works in various exhibitions in the Swiss surroundings. When her husband passed away prematurely and her children led their own lives, Kalchie devoted herself completely to her art.
The deep longing for colors arises within the artist for a long time before they are brought onto the canvas. Kalchie feels certain colors that she must use. If the urge is suppressed, she is haunted by a great sadness that only dissipates when the colors begin to flow. Her creativity is at its peak in the deep nights when she dives into her own somnambulistic world, merging it with her colors. In 1993, Kalchie graduated from the Rudolf Steiner Painting School, whose didactics keep her in constant dialogue with the universe, a master, a god while creating her works. Through this spiritual connection, her studio becomes a magical space where colors come alive and cease to be mere materials. They communicate with each other, and Kalchie becomes the authoritative observer of her own creation. Her vibrant works, together with Pashmin Art Consortia, have left the Swiss art scene and are currently on their way to China to be exhibited to an international audience at the Art Beijing 2022 art fair and the Archive Art Museum Beijing.
