GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – ‘Tis the season for cool exhibits and Geneva has an intriguing new one based on population movements as measured by cell phones.
You can’t miss it if you’re near the train station: a large-screen display above the entrance to the Metro Shopping area is the linchpin for the display called “Genève, ville vivante“, which includes 8 large explanatory panels along the rue du Mont-Blanc.
The large screen shows 15 million “movements” that are measurable from 2 million cell phone calls made on the Swisscom system during one day in the city. Geneva’s point in showcasing this is that the measurable urban movements provide a wealth of information that can be exploited to help residents or to help the city plan and to give companies useful information.
But the city points out that there is a flip side to this and the exhibition, which is linked to the 22-24 February Lift conference (theme: “What can the future do for you?”), is also designed to provoke reflection and discussion on privacy issues. “This data prompts the question of its impact in terms of data protection and privacy. It’s clear that the population is legitimately worried, with people feeling they are being watched, even if, in this case, for example, the data used is totally anonymous.”
Laurent Haug, the founder of Lift, commented on the show on Facebook, “Geneva is the first Swiss city to research how people are really using its public space, one of the first in the world. Check the data and the vizualizations, it is seriously amazing.”
The project was carried out with the city, Swisscom, Interactive Things and the Lift conference joining forces.
Drawing on the alpine vistas of the four valleys, Stephanie Noble brings her latest exhibition: “Between Summit and Sky,” to Verbier’s Nanuq Gallery. Meet the artist on 17 December 17 at 16:00.
Location: Nanuq Gallery, Route de verbier Station 51, 1936, Verbier, Suisse
Link out: http://www.stephanienoble.co.uk
Start date: 17 Dec 2011
End date: 7 Jan 2012
Exhibition by Sreyashi Ghosh: graphic poetry, expressed through pen and ink line drawings or word puzzles on paper, oil and acrylic on canvas inspired by poems fromthe author’s book “My Soul on a Platter” (see GenevaLunch review). Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursday, Fridays.
Location: Saltimbanque, 26 rue des grottes, 1202, Geneva
Start date: 20 May 2011
Start time: 14:00
End date: 20 Jun 2011
End time: 20:00
Zurich Kunsthaus star centenary show closes 30 January
Review: Picasso, the younger version
Le peintre et son modèle, Pablo Picasso, 1927 (© 2010 ProLitteris, Zurich)
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Zurich Kunthaus exhibition of Pablo Picasso’s works, the only show ever curated by the artist himself, ends 30 January and if you haven’t yet seen it, drop what you’re doing and head for the museum.
It’s a one-of-a-kind retrospective, not to be shown anywhere else once it closes, with pieces from London’s Tat, New York’s Moma and Metropolitan museums, the Pompidou in Paris and a rare treat, the loan of Le peintre et son modèle from the Contemporary Museum of Art in Tehran.
The latter was bought by the Shah of Iran, then became state property and this is its first trip abroad. It is the largest painting on display at the Kunsthaus, just as it was in 1932.
The exhibit is a remake, albeit reduced in size, of Picasso’s first museum show, in 1932.
This is the centenary exhibit for the building that houses the Kunsthaus, and it was a brilliant choice, reminding us of the role of this museum in the development of contemporary European art.
Rare chance to re-consider the artist
It is a rare opportunity for all of us to completely re-think how we view this arguably most-famous 20th century artist.
La ceinture jaune: Marie'Thérèse Walter, Pablo Picasso, 1932 (© 2010 ProLitteris, Zurich)
Museums until 1932 were places for older art, not living artists creating hotly debated contemporary works, and as such, the Picasso show caused a stir in the art world. The original had 225 paintings of art from the first three decades of his career. Today’s show has 74 paintings plus four sculptures and 30 drawings, but they form a representative collection from various Picasso periods: pink and blue, Cubist, neo-classical, Surrealist.
More than that, they offer a glimpse of how the artist himself saw his work, how he wanted to be seen. He was a successful, middle-aged painter at this point. The politically-inspired paintings, notably Guernica, were still years down the road, and the long, ragged-edged family life with various wives, suicides and tales about his temper that added an acrid note to his celebrity status, were ahead of him.
Think of the 52-year-old man who had gone through sharp poverty with his young wife, dancer Olga Khokhlova, then tasted success, a father disappointed that his son showed no artistic promise, the artist who stopped a beautiful, athletic young 17-year-old Marie-Thérèse Walter on the streets of Paris to say he would paint her, in 1927.
By Bob Evans
Click on images to view larger; more photos in GL “Albert Anker” album
Albert Anker Der Schulspaziergang, 1872 Öl auf Leinwand 90 x 150 cm loaned by Christoph Blocher
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – A gaggle of lively children, some barefoot, take a nature walk with their young teacher; a downcast farmer counts coins from his purse to pay a tax debt; a dozing old man cradles his sleeping grand-daughter on his lap.
These are some of the iconic scenes of late 19th century life captured by an artist little known outside this country that can be seen in reproduction today in homes and offices across the modern Switzerland of technology and high finance.
They are also key works in a major exhibition, “Beautiful World”, at the Bern Fine Arts Museum this summer. It marks the centenary of the 1910 death at the age of 79 of Albert Anker, often described as Switzerland’s “national artist.”
“For Swiss people, I think, Anker offers a view of a society that has gone forever but which we don’t want to forget,” says Therese Bhattacharya-Stettler, curator of the show.
Children and childhood in a small provincial town, and their relationship with the older people around them, are a focus of the exhibition.
Anker painted children as “little personalities in their own right”
Albert Anker Schlafendes Mädchen auf einer Holzbank, um 1900 Öl auf Leinwand 45 x 70 cm Kunstmuseum Bern, Dauerleihgabe
“Anker saw children as little personalities in their own right, quite outside their own class, age or gender,” says Bhattacharya, who has spent years studying his work. And the artist—a great favourite of Swiss right-wing politician Christoph Blocher who has a large collection of Anker’s works—often used his own offspring as his models.
Among the most striking paintings on display in Bern are an 1867 full-figure portrait of his blonde daughter Louise, aged 3, clutching a doll, and his son Rudi, aged 2, lying on his deathbed in 1869, a work exuding calm but also high emotion.
Invites: Permanent Mission of Peru to the United Nations Office and other International Organizations in Geneva.
Location: UN Geneva
Link out: http://www.unog.ch/unog/website/calendar.nsf/%2…
Start date: 17 Jun 2010
End date: 2 Jul 2010
Title: Nigerian artists exhibit
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: Three contemporary Nigerian artists exhibit their work at the UN in Geneva.
Start Date: 2010-03-29
End Date: 2010-04-16
Title: Exhibit: Geneva-based artists
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: An exhibit of works made by a group of Geneva-based artists. No entry fee.
Date: 2010-03-08
Title: Colourful Dreams of Remembrance: Hungarian Contemporary Roma Artists
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: Sponsored by Permanent Mission of the Republic of Hungary to the UN in Geneva.
Start Date: 2010-03-03
End Date: 2010-03-26
Title: Photo exhibit: Congo women
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: Congo Women: portraits of war and women.
Start Date: 2010-03-04
End Date: 2010-04-26
Title: Exhibit: Tissot & motor sport
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: This exhibit in the City’s centre promises a high dose of adrenaline and “white knuckles.”
Start Date: 2010-03-01
End Date: 2010-03-29
Title: Family activity in English at the museum
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: Take the humanitarian road. Sponsored by the friends of the International School of Geneva. In English, for those 8-16 years old and their parents. Free entrance under 16 years old.
Start Time: 11:00
Date: 2010-02-14
Title: Exhibit: Kosovo
Location: Nyon, Vaud
Link out: Click here
Description: A Swiss photographer’s view of Kosovo.
Start Date: 2010-01-28
End Date: 2010-02-28
Title: Exhibit: Portraits and stories of women in the Middle East
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: From one country to another the photographs taken by reporter Alexandra Boulat (1962-2006) show the world Muslim women live in and the differences in their status and the roles they play: war victim, refugee, political militant, academic, TV anchorwoman, teacher at the women’s police academy and oriental baby-doll. Last few days!
Start Date: 2010-01-10
End Date: 2010-01-24
Allison Wilbur, quilter, Douglas Griffiths of the US Mission in Geneva and Barbara Lee, US House of Representatives, at exhibit opening 12 November
Dawn Maria Piasta from Canada with her quilt, Geneva Quilt Challenge at the UN
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – A warming exhibit, in every sense, has opened at the UN Palais building in Geneva, with a display of American quilts made specially to promote the work of Geneva-based Global Fund for Malaria, Aids and Tuberculosis. The show, “Making a healthier world for our children”, is organized by Geneva’s US Mission to coincide with the annual United Nations Women’s Guild fundraising bazaar, which pulls in thousands of visitors.
Title: Exhibition: Grazia La Padula
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: The Italian artist Grazia La Padula will exhibit 60 illustrations in Geneva for a short period of time.
Start Date: 17 Sep 2009
End Date: 14 Oct 2009
Title: Photograph exhibit: People’s faces
Location: Thonon, France
Link out: Click here
Description: Olivier Marchetti’s photographs of French actor and director Valère Novarina will be exhibited in Thonon, France until the end of September.
Start Date: 25 Aug 2009
End Date: 25 Sep 2009
Title: Exhibition: Greece, ligth and freedom
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: At the Voltaire Institute and Museum. A pictorial account of Greece in the Ottoman Empire.
Start Date: 01 Jul 2009
End Date: 26 Sep 2009
Title: Exhibit: Passions partagées, from Cézanne to Rothko
Location: Lausanne, Vaud
Link out: Click here
Description: From Cézanne to Rothko, 20th century masterpieces
in private Swiss collections.
Start Date: 26 Jun 2009
End Date: 25 Oct 2009
Title: Exhibition: My homeland is within my soul
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: At the Palais de Nations, an exhibit of 40 paintings belonging to a private 20th-century art collection.
You must reserve in advance by calling: +41 22 917 22 94
Start Date: 11 Jun 2009
End Date: 17 Jul 2009
Title: Exhibition: Rare documents and books
Location: Lausanne, Vaud
Link out: Click here
Description: At the Cantonal and University Library an exhibit of rare documents received in the past two years.
Start Date: 11 Jun 2009
End Date: 20 Sep 2009
Title: Swiss photography from the 1930s
Location: Prangins, Vaud
Link out: Click here
Description: The exhibition showcases a visual confrontation between pictorialists and modernists.
Start Date: 05 Jun 2009
End Date: 25 Oct 2009
Title: Exhibition: La Ruche, city of artists
Location: Evian, France
Link out: Click here
Description: La Ruche, city of artists is an exhibition encompassing 87 years of art at the heart of Montparnasse in Paris.
Start Date: 01 May 2009
End Date: 10 May 2009
Title: Exhibit: Van Gogh – The landscapes
Location: Basel
Link out: Click here
Description: An important retrospective of Vincent Van Gogh in the Kunstmuseum of Basel.
Seventy paintings –famous and rarely seen works– will give a completely new insight into van Gogh’s body of work.
Start Date: 26 Apr 2009
End Date: 26 Sep 2009
Title: Exhibitions: Swatches, watches and masks
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: Three exhibitions at the Cité du Temps:
- Touch your time by Tissot
- The mask dance by Y. Shimizu
- And the Swatch collection permanent exhibition.
Start Date: 22 Apr 2009
End Date: 22 May 2009
Title: Exhibition: A question of identity
Location: Geneva
Link out: Click here
Description: Wondering how identities are defined? Check out this site and under “vernissage” you will find pictures of the upcoming exhibition that will make you think twice about your identity.
Start Date: 22 Apr 2009
End Date: 10 May 2009
