iKunstmuseum Basel (Hauptbau and Neubau)St. Alban
Prints from the Swiss Graphic Society, shown in the Hauptbau graphic cabinets.
In 1997 Hervé Graumann printed identical computer-drawn grids on an inkjet printer, then treated each sheet with water, so no two came out alike. That is the kind of rule-bending this show follows across 34 prints made between 1917 and 2026.
Every one is an annual edition of the Schweizerische Graphische Gesellschaft, whose 125 members each get one impression of every print. Basel gets the very first, because the society's first president also ran the museum. You start in the left cabinet with the two debut editions of 1918, then Klee, Kirchner and Alice Bailly's 1923 print, the first by a woman. The right cabinet covers the last 30 years: prints on leather and Plexiglas, a book, and Meret Oppenheim's endless calendar, meant to be turned over every day, which is more commitment than the Advent calendar you'll open next month.
It fills the two graphic cabinets of the Hauptbau, is included in the CHF 25 ticket and closes on 29 November. Wednesdays run to 8pm.
Omar Ba's child in a life preserver
Look for the large-format print of a child floating in a life preserver on a river of flowers and the blue of the UN flag.
Hervé Graumann's water-treated grids
Identical computer-made grids from an inkjet printer, each turned into a one-off once the sheet was treated with water.
Christiane Baumgartner's Illumination
Woodcuts made from film frames, blurred by a raster grid until you can barely make out bombs falling in the Second World War.
Sandrine Pelletier's Black Sun
Not a print but the plate itself: brass and copper still carrying traces of etching acid and printing ink.
Laure Marville's Nora
A linocut figure standing at a Geneva crossroads near the old execution site for witches, recast as a woman who claims witchcraft as power.
You want paintings: this is 34 works on paper and plate in two graphic cabinets.
Votre image ? Demandez-nous de la corriger ou de la retirer.