Denise Bertschi: Oasis of Peace. Neutral Only On The Outside / Claudia & Julia Miller: Une brève histoire de baskets sales (A Brief History of Dirty Sneakers)

Denise Bertschi: Oasis of Peace. Neutral Only On The Outside
September 12–November 14, 2021
Artist talk with Heonik Kwon: October 21
Artist talk with Denise Bertschi and Doris Gassert, Fotomuseum Winterthur: November 13

Cracks in appearances, representations out of step with reality, and gaps in historiography are all of interest to Denise Bertschi (b. 1983). The artist seeks in her work to render visible the links between Switzerland and global geopolitics. To this end, she retraces Swiss colonial entanglements and ambivalent relations in the world of economics, while calling into question narratives of nationalism and the notion of neutrality. Using the tools of historians, anthropologists, or investigative journalists, she creates installations and videos in which archival documents and personal photographs commingle with the narratives of the people she encounters and the findings of her own research. 

The exhibition Oasis of Peace. Neutral Only On The Outside establishes unexpected links between Switzerland and two regions of major geopolitical importance: first, the demilitarized zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea; and second, apartheid  South Africa. Switzerland has played its cards cleverly in both cases, using to its own ends a “neutrality” that the historian Hans-Ulrich Jost has characterized as “self-serving“ and “dualist.“

Claudia & Julia Müller: Une brève histoire de baskets sales (A Brief History of Dirty Sneakers)
September 12–November 14, 2021
Opening: September 11

Claudia & Julia Müller (b. 1964; b. 1965) stage familiar or mysterious situations in large-scale, partly hand-drawn murals, fusing figurative representation with ornaments and fragments, abstraction and dissection. Drawing on their vast archive of images, they examine looks exchanged, power structures, and the interrelation of affection and animosity; in short, the entire contradictory range of human existence. Using portraiture along with an installation of painted lamps that connects interior and exterior spaces, the exhibition at the CCS focuses on moments of transition, forms of living together, and situations of fragility and reorientation.