Silvia Bächli

Silvia Bächli was born in Baden, Switzerland, in 1956. She lives and works in Basel.

Trained at the École d’arts appliqués in Basel during the second half of the 1970’s, then at the École supérieure d’art visuel in Geneva, Silvia Bächli was forever marked by the hotbed of artistic activity surrounding the Contemporary Art Museum and the Kunsthalle in Basel in the late 1970’s through the 1980’s. In 1981 she co-founded the nomadic, alternative project space Filiale Basel.

In her drawings, Bächli explores the very edges of the world, trying to understand how everything works and to establish, according to this exploration, a certain order. She seems disinterested in showing the whole, focusing instead on details, interstices, or fragments - the reflection or shadow of things. She uses herself, her body, her life, her history, and her surroundings as a jumping-off point. She works mostly on sheets of white paper, working in Indian Ink, charcoal, oil pastels, and gouache in a palette ranging from pale gray to deep black.

— Courtesy Jonas Storsve

 Available works

 Exhibitions

Selected outdoor exhibitions

Documentation about Silvia Bächli

Silvia Bächli’s Biography (French)

Silvia Bächli’s Biography (English)

Catherine Daunt, “Silvia Bächli: Partitura”, 2024 (English)

Daniel Kurjaković, “A Non-Figurative Imagination ”, 2018 (English)

Daniel Kurjaković, “Eine nicht-figurative Imagination”, 2018 (German)

Samuel Herzog, “ Zu Gast in einem fremden Universum”, NZZ, 2015 (German)

Konrad Bitterli, “ Silvia Bächli – in space. Sketching her work.”, 2012 (English)

Konrad Bitterli, “Silvia Bächli - Im Raum. Eine Werkskizze”, 2012 (German)

Jonas Storsve, « Nuit et Jour - Quelques propos épars sur l'oeuvre de Silvia Bächli », 2008 (French)

Jonas Storsve, « Night and Day – a scattering of considerations on the drawings of Silvia Bächli », 2008 (English)

Ulrich Loock, « Silvia Bächli – Studio », 2007 (English)

Catherine Pavlovic, « Silvia Bächli », 2006 (French)

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