Silvia Bächli

*1965 | Schweiz

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 helped create 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 India Ink, charcoal, oil pastels, and gouache in a palette ranging from pale gray to deep black.