Early days
Roman antiquity has left many traces in Switzerland. Among the most exceptional are the Orbe mosaics from the Boscéaz site, north of the Alps. They feature figurative and geometric scenes in an excellent state of preservation. They originally adorned a luxurious villa on the site. The Roman Museum in Vallon also houses mosaics, including the famous "Bacchus and Ariadne". Built on the site of an ancient Gallo-Roman villa, the museum's showcases shed light on the daily life of the period. Geneva's renowned Musée d'Art et d'Histoire (MAH) exhibits a wide variety of marble sculptures, both whole and fragmentary, including striking portraits in the round.
Medieval art
Following in the footsteps of Sens and Senlis, the portal of Lausanne's Notre-Dame cathedral is a masterpiece of 13th-century statuary. The tympanum is dominated by the coronation of the Virgin Mary in a building that also features Christ in glory. The portal's originality lies in its polychromy. Patiently restored, it has regained the tonalities that make it an exception in European medieval art.
During the Gothic period, Swiss sculpture was enriched mainly by contributions from the Île-de-France region. In painting, a naturalistic trend blended with the religious subjects that had been omnipresent for centuries. The painter Konrad Witz (1400-1447) produced an original body of work that fascinated viewers with its play on perspective, combined with pre-Renaissance influences. Witz's La Pêche miraculeuse (The Miraculous Peach) depicts the surroundings of Lake Geneva, making it the first painting in history to set a religious scene in a realistic natural setting. Produced for the city's cathedral, this tempera was part of the altarpiece of St. Peter's, which was badly damaged by the Protestant Reformation. As the Renaissance took shape, frescoes gave way to landscapes and figures painted on wooden panels.
Later, Renaissance artists were called upon to create statues for urban fountains. The middle of the 16th century saw the construction of a large number of fountains with themes dictated by the wealthier classes of the population: bravery and justice were given pride of place.
Reformation and counter-reformation
In the 16th century, John Calvin made his mark. Iconoclasm was rampant in the Reformed cities of Zurich, Bern, Basel and Geneva. All images, deemed harmful, were banned. Churches were emptied of their sculptures and works of art destroyed. Artists turned to private commissions, creating stained-glass windows and portraits. It wasn't until the following century that the Counter-Reformation revived commissions, especially for Baroque sculptors. Hans-Ulrich Räber's eleven statues in his Blatten Entombment (1645) reflect a popular style. Simon Bachmann of Muri helped introduce the Italian-Flemish Baroque style.
From the Revolution to Füssli
With the revolution of 1798, sculptors broke free from the corporative system. This autonomy was accompanied by a sense of national belonging. Exiled sculptors returned home to build careers in reformed cities. Swiss painters, lacking art schools or patrons, left to train and work abroad. Jean-Étienne Liotard's (1702-1789) talent as a portraitist and miniaturist was acclaimed by the European courts. This great traveler also painted the more modest, venturing as far as the Near East. Among his many works, we should mention Liotard laughing, a self-portrait exhibited at the MAH.
Among those who chose to try their luck abroad, Jacques-Laurent Agasse from Geneva became an animal painter in England, while Johann Heinrich Füssli (b. Zurich 1741 - d. England 1825) specialized in fantastic subjects. The Nightmare painter, who was also a writer, was later recognized by the Surrealist movement as one of its precursors. The son of a painter, he received a classical education and was ordained a clergyman when he was forced into exile. Moving from one country to another, he taught art and distinguished himself in a kind of romanticism before its time. He put his illustrative talent at the service of the writings of Shakespeare and Dante. The expressiveness of his fantastic universe made him famous.
The art of landscape
Tourism developed very early in the Alps. The beauty of the mountains quickly became a fashionable subject, developed both in painting and photography. Caspar Wolf and the Genevan François Diday painted high-altitude landscapes with realism.
At a time when Switzerland was establishing itself as a federal state, local artists were perceived as lacking assertiveness in the European context. Art societies were formed to promote Swiss artists. Tournus, or traveling art shows, began to take place from 1840 onwards.
The 19th century saw the emergence of patriotic art. Private individuals commissioned sculptors and fresco artists to create patriotic monuments. The genre reached its apogee with Ferdinand Hodler's paintings for the Swiss National Museum. After the new Constitution of 1848, each canton erected its own monument to reformers, scholars or warriors. Karl Alfred Lanz creates the equestrian statue of General Guillaume-Henri Dufour in Geneva.
Toepffer, Hodler, Hans Erni
The Geneva school found its figurehead in Wolfgang Adam Toepffer (1766-1847), a genre painter and caricaturist trained in Paris. In 1850, Barthélemy Menn became director of the future Geneva School of Fine Arts, where he taught for forty-two years. A pupil of Menn, Ferdinand Hodler (1853-1918) settled in Geneva in 1872. A major figure of Symbolism, he is considered by our neighbors to be one of the fathers of modern art. His crude realism disconcerted his contemporaries. In his best-known paintings, he depicts craftsmen, introducing symbolism through meticulous detail and studied lighting.
Extremely popular in Switzerland, Hans Erni (1909-2015) trained in Paris, where he met the Cubists, Mondrian and Kandinsky. Throughout his long career, he practiced painting, sculpture and engraving. His unique style is characterized by outlines outlined in white and plump figures accompanied by animals. The artist likes to confront Antiquity with the modern world, science with mythology. In Geneva, you can admire the ceramic bas-relief adorning the façade of Manor, or Placette. In the year of his centenary, his monumental fresco on the theme of Peace, commissioned by the city, adorns the entrance to the Palais des Nations.
Giacometti and the modern age
Throughout Switzerland, various currents were shaking up twentieth-century art. Groups formed: concrete abstraction gave rise to Rot-Blau in Basel. The Dada movement born in Zurich brought together Jean Arp, Sophie Taeuber, Tristan Tzara and Hugo Ball. Others look abroad: Cunot Amiet joins Die Brücke, Le Corbusier establishes purism in Paris.
The son of an esteemed Impressionist painter, Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966) is one of the greatest artists of our time. To discover his art, an itinerary has been designed to guide you through the various landmarks of his career. Perched in the Graubünden village of Stampa, where the master grew up, Giacometti's studio is open in summer, complementing the Centro Giacometti and the local museum, Ciasa Granda. Along the way, a visit to the Kunsthaus Zürich, the Swiss Giacometti Foundation, is a must. With thousands of works from the 13th century to the present day, the collection offers a spectacular space for Giacometti's art, echoing the Paris foundation. The more modest Musée des Beaux-Arts in Chur also devotes a room to the Giacometti fathers and sons.
The Pensiun Aldier in Sent pays tribute to Alberto and Diego, the Giacometti brothers, as well as to Ernst Scheidegger, a photographer and gallery owner close to the sculptor, who immortalized his life and work from 1943 until his death. A museum associated with a house dotted with precious objects, original photographs and sculptures by Diego.
From the 1970s to the present day
Initially an abstract painter, Jean Tinguely (1925-1991) revealed himself in the sculpture of movement through his astonishing machines. Beyond their joyful freedom, his Dadaist works question the absurdity of the world. They brightened up many Swiss cities, including Fribourg and Basel.
In the 1970s, his explorations continued with Body Art, Land Art, installations and video art. At the cutting edge of contemporary art, the MAMCO has been championing the Geneva scene since 1960. Housed in the same building, which it also shares with the Centre de la photographie, the Centre d'art contemporain promotes the emerging local and international scene.
The Swiss have been exploring photographic art for a few short decades. It was promoted as an artistic discipline with the opening of the first galleries in the 1980s. Before that, in the 1950s, an early Swiss style was characterized by the sharpness and neutrality of its images. Objective photography, as represented by Hans Finsler, Werner Bischof and René Burri, was at odds with experimental photography from Germany. Later, Swiss photographers experimented with abstraction, chiaroscuro and surrealism. Two museums, the Élysée in Lausanne and the Museum of Photography in Winterthur, exhibit all the genres of photography from around the world.
Street art enthusiasts have their own festival, held in Chur in June, featuring guided tours and live painting. In Geneva, there are several areas to explore, starting with Les Grottes, behind the Cornavin train station. The hunt for street art continues to the west, in Jonction, on the banks of the Rhône and around La Pointe. Jazi, Eazyone and the EDK Crew collective find inspiring supports here. Geneva's graffiti artists let their colors explode on the walls of a former restaurant on Avenue de Champel, including a Frankenstein fresco that can be spotted from afar. In Carouge, the exterior and interior walls of the Halles de la Fonderie are covered in pictorial works. Another Street Art destination is Basel, also known for its famous Art Basel fair. Graffiti and frescoes can be seen in the city center, as well as at the Schänzli, along the tracks of the main railway station. A specialist in urban culture, the Artstübli gallery offers Street Art tours. The Kunstmuseum Basel has recently opened a third exhibition space to showcase contemporary art.
