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Art Collection

© Tony Cragg

Our commitment to – and passion for – the world of art

Art is an endless source of inspiration that encourages us to look beyond the ordinary and the everyday.

The EFG Art Collection is an integrated part of our identity, celebrating the past and inspiring the future whilst creating a sustainable, dynamic and inspiring environment. The bank is a member of the International Association of Corporate Collections of Contemporary Art (IACCCA), which brings together curators of leading corporate collections from around the world.

Tracing the routes of our Collection

Over time and as the bank has evolved, it has acquired and developed a collection of more than 1,300 artworks by artists from different nations and periods, tracing an arc through history, from Old Masters to the Avant Garde who reached maturity in the mid-1960s, and up to the present day.

More than 650 works from the collection – from paintings, photographs, drawings and sculptures to video art and installations – are currently on display either in the bank’s own premises or in temporary exhibitions in museums.

Amongst the works are creations by some of Switzerland and Italy’s most inspiring artists, including Bernardino Luini, Franz Gertsch and Alighiero Boetti, to name a few examples.

At the heart of the collection is a series of artworks acquired in 2007. In particular, this includes a group of exceptional paintings, photographs and drawings by young Swiss artists that were collected from 1968 onwards. The second major component of the collection is a selection of works by internationally recognised personalities in art from the period following the Second World War, including Daniel Buren, John Chamberlain, Tony Cragg, Mario Merz and Giulio Paolini.

© Giulio Paolini

Sharing masterpieces : lending our art to the world

Today, one of the defining strengths of the collection is its repertoire of large-scale installations and monumental works. Many of these pieces exceed the physical scope of EFG’s own premises and are thus regularly loaned to museums and public institutions. These collaborations allow the artworks to be experienced in a meaningful context, making EFG a custodian rather than a mere possessor of cultural heritage.

Urs Lüthi’s portrait by Franz Gertsch (1930-2022), a highlight from the 1970s that is usually on display at the EFG Bank in Lugano, will be on temporary loan to the retrospective Franz Gertsch. Blow-Up (14.8.2026–17.1.2027), shown in two parts in the Kunstmuseum Bern and the Museum Franz Gertsch. Urs Lüthi, an iconic Swiss artist, was a close friend and colleague of Franz Gertsch: they shared a studio in Bern and were both part of the Bernese art scene.

Sharing masterpieces : lending our art to the world
Tony Cragg (1949, Liverpool UK), Menschenmenge, 1984, installation view - ©Tony Cragg

Seen from the correct distance, the wall installation resembles a large mural. Close-up, however, it appears to be an inconsistent proliferation of fragments that are unrelated to the scene viewed from afar. The appeal of the work stems from its inner ability to heighten its legibility by fragmenting the materials it is composed of, in other words, its intrinsic capacity to incorporate and present the history of its origins.

This monumental work was on temporary loan to the exhibition OIL. Beauty and Horror in the Petrol Age at the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (04.09.2021 - 09.01.2022).

Mario_Merz_Bicocca.JPG
Mario Merz (1925, Milan I - 2003, Turin I), Senza Titolo (Luoghi senza strada), 1994, installation view - © Mario Merz

Created for a solo show at the Christian Stein gallery in Milan in 1994, the igloo in EFG’s collection is one of the numerous variations that followed the first Luoghi senza strada, exhibited in 1979 at the Museum Folkwang in Essen.

Merz’s name is undeniably linked with the igloo, which first appeared in his work in 1968. He made the igloo to create a self-contained space, independent from walls, pedestals, or any fixed way of displaying art. For him, the igloo is both an absolute, simple form and a poetic, visionary interpretation of place, no longer tied to serving a specific function.

The igloo was on temporary loan to the exhibition Mario Merz Igloos (25.10.2018 – 24.02.2019) at the Pirelli HangarBicocca in Milan and is on permanent loan to the MASI Lugano.

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Let's start ours and build something valuable today.

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  • EFG Bank AG
    Bleicherweg 8
    P.O. Box 6012 - 8022 Zurich
  • +41 44 226 17 17

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  • EFG Bank AG
    Bleicherweg 8
    P.O. Box 6012 - 8022 Zurich
  • +41 44 226 17 17
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