“Art changes technology, technology changes art.”
ATA BOZACI
(born March 3, 1974, in Burgdorf) is a Swiss artist and entrepreneur. His work encompasses drawing, painting, digital graphics, large-scale wallpainting and modular sculpture. From 1990 to 2012 his principle creative output was graffiti writing; he is known for graffiti works under the pseudonym TOAST.
LIFE AND WORK
Bozaci grew up in a working-class Turkish family. His drawing talent was already recognised in primary school. From 1990 to 1991 he undertook a foundation course at an art and design school. From 1992 to 1996 he studied in the graphics department at the Schule für Gestaltung (Design School), Bern. For his graduation work he made the first-ever sprayed comic. His desire to connect graffiti with graphics almost cost him his place studying. In 1992 he was invited to take part in a group exhibition with H. R. Giger at Art Frankfurt. In 1995 he designed the artwork for hip-hop band Fettes Brot’s album ‘Auf einem Auge blöd’. Further graphic commissions followed within the Bernese club and cultural scene, including a collaboration with the cult magazine SODA.
Bozaci graduated from his graphic design course when he was 22 and started working freelance in Bern. He produced 15 skateboard designs for Intersport in collaboration with the graphic design studio Büro Destruct.
While Bozaci was an intern at Springer & Jacoby in Hamburg, he developed a close friendship with Mirko Reisser DAIM / getting-up. In 2001 they and other artists realised a 2000 m2 graffiti installation opposite Hamburger Harbour wharf, on the exterior wall of the Blohm + Voss shipyard at Dock 10, entitled ‘Das neue Hamburg und seine Partnerstädte’ (The New Hamburg and its Twin Cities).
In 2007 Bozaci was awarded his own color by spray-paint producer Molotow, called ‘TOAST signal black’.
ARTISTIC CAREER
In the late 1990s Bozaci established the company Atalier Visual Entertainment with business partners Remy Burger and Patric Geissbühler, concentrating on online game commissions. They became the most successful firm in their sector, with Die Mobiliar, Swiss Dairy Producers and the Swiss Post among their clients. In 2004 Atalier won Bronze in the Swiss Dialogue Marketing Prize. By 2007 Bozaci left Atalier in order to work purely as an artist.
The art collector Gunter Sachs invited Bozaci, alongside Basel graffiti writer Dare, to design his apartment at the Schlosshotel Velden. Linked by the title ‘Point of View’, the artists painted six immersive pictures which merge into one complete image from just a few points of view.[6] The work was illustrated in full in the Architectural Digest (AD) magazine. For the special exhibition ‘Die Kunst ist weiblich’ about Gunter Sachs’ life and work at the Museum der bildenden Künste (Fine Art Museum) in Leipzig, Bozaci realised a large-scale picture on steel. Bozaci's collaboration with the Galerie Springmann from Freiburg began in 2008. Group exhibitions followed with Dare, Stefan Strumbel and the street art pioneer Blek le Rat. Two works from Gunter Sachs’ collection, ‘Satan in Heaven ’and ‘Black devil’ sold well above their estimates at Sotheby's auction house in London in 2012. In 2014 two further Bozaci works were auctioned at Karl&Faber in Munich.