PAUL KLEE CENTER (ZENTRUM PAUL KLEE)

This is one of the highlights of your visit to Bern. The Institution is mainly devoted to the life and work of Paul Klee, a German artist born in Switzerland, near Bern, to a father who was a music teacher and a mother who was a singer. From an early age, Klee turned to the plastic arts. On a trip to Tunisia in 1914, he wrote in his diary: "Color possesses me, I no longer need to search for it. This is what this happy moment means: I and color are one

Paul Klee flourished in abstraction, playing with symbols and colors. A professor at the Bauhaus in Weimar, he was at the height of his artistic powers from 1920 onwards. But the coming to power of the Nazis precipitated his end. Classified by them as a "degenerate artist", he moved to Switzerland before his death in 1940.

In a wave-shaped building designed by architect Renzo Piano, inaugurated in 2005, the Centre houses the world's largest collection of over 4,000 works, including paintings, watercolours and drawings by the painter. It also features exhibitions dedicated to other artists. In 2023, the public will discover the late works of Joan Miró. Under the title "New Horizons", 74 works produced from the late 1960s onwards are presented for the first time in Switzerland. At the beginning of 2024, the German Dadaist Hanna Höch will be in the spotlight. Finally, as a true cultural center, the establishment offers concerts in its auditorium.