Featured Events in Zurich in May, 2025 (May Updated)

The exhibition at the National Museum Zurich shines a spotlight on a culture still embraced enthusiastically by millions of people around the world today. Video and audio installations in a setting designed to look like a record shop take visitors on a journey through the evolution of electronic sound and let them explore the social, political, economic and aesthetic dimensions of techno culture in Switzerland.

Monster Chetwynd (b. 1973 London, lives and works in Zurich), also previously known under the names Lali, Spartacus and Marvin Gaye Chetwynd, shot to international fame in the 2000s with her excuberant performances that recall medieval mystery plays and carnival theatre and draw on themes from both art history and popular culture. In 2012, she became the first performance artist to be nominated for the prestigious Turner Prize and is today one of the leading figures working in the field of contemporary performance. However, Chetwynd’s artistic production is much broader, encompassing disciplines including painting, sculpture, installations and films. Her artistic practice draws on a vast range of cultural sources and combines them into something new. Humour, curiosity and collaboration are key. The exhibition, created in collaboration with curator Raphael Gygax, offers the first comprehensive overview of Chetwynd’s work in Switzerland. More than 60 pieces from the last 25 years will be combined with an immersive exhibition architecture.

The Kunsthaus Zürich presents a diverse exhibition programme that unites opposites and opens up innovative ways of viewing art. The focus is on surprising moments that invite visitors to rethink boundaries and open up new worlds of perception. This year's outstanding artists include Roman Signer, known for his spectacular installations, Monster Chetwynd, whose provocative works challenge traditional art forms, and Refik Anadol, a pioneer of AI-supported art. These and other globally unique projects offer fresh perspectives and unforgettable experiences that go beyond traditional exhibition formats. From the iconic Dada movement to cutting-edge digital art, from intimate to large-scale works, the coming year promises an inspiring journey through time, space and media at Kunsthaus Zürich.

This exhibition will focus on the textile works of American artist Sheila Hicks, Swiss artist Elsi Giauque and others, ranging from plain and simple fabrics to fancy and colorful tassels, from two-dimensional geometric pattern weaving to free-form products in three-dimensional space, striving to present the creativity of the artists and the unique appeal they give to their works.

The Kunsthaus Zürich shows the fascinating world of Roman Signer. The large exhibition gallery will be transformed into an open artistic landscape where playful energy and a deep sense of wonder about nature come together.

James Franco is certainly the only Hollywood star to read Marcel Proust on Spiderman films sets. Twice Golden Globe-awarded (2002 for James Dean role; 2018 for The Disaster Artist), Oscar-nominated, the 46 year old actor played in some hundred films and series since he was 16. Actor-director-producer, James Franco has been parallelly acting in life as an academic with a PhD from Yale, a writer publishing poetry, a model for Gucci, and mostly as a visual artist since his teenage years developing a considerable visual work mixing painting, video art and performance. After shows with MOCA Los Angeles (Rebel, 2012, along with artists friends Paul McCarthy, Douglas Gordon, Ed Ruscha…) and in galleries including Pace and Gagosian, Franco presents his new exhibition at Galerie Gmurzynska, Zurich, titled Hollywood is Hell. A powerful series of rough and complex collages composed of various layers of images and signs, symbols and text. 28 shocking canvases and objets d’art appearing as destroyed posters on the street walls of some dirty district will be on display: those collages represent for James Franco “a portrait of Los Angeles during Covid, the artist explains. The streets were empty, the posters damaged on the walls… It was a sort of almost post-apocalyptic atmosphere. I lived at that time near the Hollywood cemetery, where so many stars are buried, and I was walking there. Dreamland had became for me a waste land. And this shit is actually how the dream factory looks like”. One of those collages on canvas is purposely titled: “Hollywood is Hell”. The whole series of works, exhibited for the first time, constitutes a kind of deconstruction of a certain glamorous mythology of Hollywood. Masculinity is devastated – from Bruce Willis’ figure to Batman icon, through Jordan and Travolta – as one of the pillars of a decadent mass entertainment culture. It may come as no surprise that James Franco loves William Burroughs’ literature and his deconstructed writing. Those collages are true deconstructed works. James Franco likes more than everything to walk on the opposite side of the shinning Dream City fantasy. In the highly-standardized Hollywood system, art eventually became a kind of refuge for the actor, the last place of freedom.

Galerie Peter Kilchmann presents “Red Romance”, the first solo exhibition of South Korean artist Sea Hyun Lee. Known for his spectacular “Red Sansu” landscapes, Lee’s work employs vibrant red tones to evoke emotions such as grief, pain, fear, and beauty, while simultaneously challenging the viewer to look beyond the surface of idyllic landscapes and explore the complexities beneath.

Mai 36 Galerie presents its first solo exhibition of the work of London-based, Dutch artist Magali Reus. In “Full House” three recent bodies of sculptural and photographic work – What Grows (2022), Landings (2022) and Clementine (2022–3) – explore ecology and systems of production, teasing out the tensions between constructed nature, high technology and the impact of post-industrial human activity. These works are presented at Mai 36 Galerie alongside an intervention in the gallery space of wall paintings derived from vernacular Swiss Appenzell illustrations.

This exhibition is held in memory of Rémy Zaugg (1943–2005), one of the most radical Swiss artists, making 20 years since his passing. It offers a chance to revisit his work and reflect on the lasting impact of his artistic vision. Rémy Zaugg’s work and writings consistently engaged with the interplay between the role of the painter and painting, perception, and space. His conceptual practice sought to redefine the viewer’s role in experiencing art, emphasizing the significance of language in shaping visual reality.

With "Toward Architecture," Le Corbusier created a manifesto and laid the foundation for modernism. To mark the 100th anniversary of this work, the exhibition of the same name examines the collected texts and examines current architectural discourses and future perspectives.

Information Source: Robin Snowdon | eventbrite

Community Farmer Days Spend a joyful day surrounded by nature and community as you volunteer on our working, organic farm, helping us grow veg and care for wildlife. Our Community Farmer Days are brilliant fun for all ages and we provide a shared lunch for everyone who comes. The Community Farm is a community-owned, social enterprise that wants to share the joys of food and farming with you! Our fields are in a beautiful setting, overlooking Chew Valley Lake. Adults and children are welcome, there’s loads to learn and no experience is necessary. Pay what you can, free tickets are available. “ Everyone was completely lovely and it was a truly excellent day. We can’t wait to go back .” — Community Farm Day attendee What we'll be doing Longer, warmer days mean we can now celebrate the start of a new growing season. Help us to prepare the fields and get this year’s crops in the ground. 'Must read' for first time Community Farmers To comply with health and safety legislation it is important for us to have all attendees details logged onto our Mailchimp database in advance. You will only need to fill this in once. This information will be confidential and not used for any other purpose. Please click "here" to register on our database. Any questions, please email us on volunteer@thecommunityfarm.co.uk Read more about Community Farmer Days Information Source: The Community Farm | eventbrite

The STONE WORLDS is the International mineral trade show brings together Around 45 exhibitors offer their most beautiful gemstones, minerals, crystals, rough stones, jewelry, healing stones, fossils and other stone works The STONE WORLDS is the International mineral trade show brings together Around 45 exhibitors offer their most beautiful gemstones, minerals, crystals, rough stones, jewelry, healing stones, fossils and other stone works. Information Source: Kurt Worni | expotobi

Bernheim Gallery is pleased to present Mortal Thoughts, a group show that brings together the practices of four artists: Nutsa Gogaladze, Ant Łakomsk, Travis MacDonald, and Rico Weber. The exhibition explores the lingering traces of absence and presence that remain as echoes of past experiences or as conjured fragments from the unknown. Working at the intersection of abstraction and figuration, the exhibition continuously hints at a fragment of memory that remains hidden, never fully unveiled. Through abstraction, obscured figures, and the interplay of light and shadow, this theme unfolds literally in the paintings of Łakomsk and MacDonald, where hazy figures emerge through painterly brushstrokes, as well as more conceptually through the works of Gogaladze and Weber, which explore how memory materialises within spatial constructs.

Lullin + Ferrari present new works by Franziska Furter (*1972 in Zurich, lives and works in Basel) in her seventh solo exhibition at the gallery.

Architect@Work Switzerland 2025 is a two-day event that will be held at the prestigious Zurich Exhibition Hall in Zürich, Switzerland. This highly anticipated event showcases a wide range of innovative and cutting-edge building systems, as well as interior design and construction services that are essential for any architectural project. From building carcasses to interior finishing, roof construction to lighting systems, attendees will have the opportunity to explore and discover the latest advancements in the industry. The event also features exhibitors specializing in sanitary ware, air and water tightening services, and roof covering services, providing a comprehensive platform for professionals to network and stay up-to-date with the latest trends and technologies. Architect@Work Switzerland 2025 is a must-attend event for architects, designers, and industry experts who are looking to enhance their knowledge and expand their professional network. Mark your calendars for May 7th to May 8th, 2025, and join us at the Zurich Exhibition Hall to experience this exceptional event firsthand.

This January, the artist Rachel Khedoori presents an installation of new work in the second-floor gallery of Hauser & Wirth Zurich, Limmatstrasse. Over the course of a career spanning 30 years, Khedoori has worked in various mediums—film, sculpture and installation to reinterpret space and challenge perception through the discrete displacement of her mediums, materials and forms.

For her second exhibition with Hauser & Wirth and her first solo show in Switzerland, Uman presents all new paintings and works on paper at the gallery’s Zurich location on Limmatstrasse in partnership with Nicola Vassell Gallery, New York NY. Working in Upstate New York, Uman’s new paintings reflect her reverence for the natural world. Fluidly navigating in-between realms to explore both the physical and spiritual, the artist intertwines abstraction, figuration and meditative patterning. Expanding on this unique visual language, Uman’s new body of work also explores ideas of color field painting. With some works suspended from the ceiling and a site-specific wall mural that transforms part of the gallery space, Uman invites the viewer to be immersed in her lavishly detailed and opulently colored worlds, replete with gesture, geometry and evocations of the sublime.

Christophe Guye Galerie presents the third solo exhibition “The Tapestry” by Erik Madigan Heck (*1983, United States) at the gallery. On display is a selection of works, most of them from his latest monograph “The Tapestry”, published by Thames & Hudson in late 2024.

Christophe Guye Galerie presents an exhibition of works by Swiss photographer Balthasar Burkhard (1944-2010, Switzerland) in Kabinet II of the gallery.Burkhard was an outstanding photographer who worked as both a documentary and artistic photographer from the 1960s onwards. After his training with Kurt Blum and his first commissions - for example as a documentary photographer for the Kunsthalle Bern under Harald Szeemann - he developed pioneering works such as the ‘Photocanvases’, in which photographs were exposed directly onto canvases. His work, which moves between photography, sculpture, object and painting, is characterised by clear, reduced black and white pictures.

Galerie Fabian Lang and the estate of Werner Frei - his three daughters - celebrate the life and works of this exceptional artist.

The photographs in this exhibition were sourced from the artist’s extensive collection of found online images depicting individuals asleep. These photographs date back to the early days of the internet when platforms like Picasa, Blogger, and Photobucket played a key role in the hosting and sharing of images. None of these photographs can be found online today, nor can they be reverse image searched. While they may still exist on personal servers or digital cameras, their public-facing presence has, in most cases, vanished from the world.

Galerie Eva Presenhuber presents the group show Wall Works & Sculptures, showcasing works by Walead Beshty, Angela Bulloch, Sylvie Fleury, Liam Gillick, Douglas Gordon, John Giorno, Adam Pendleton, Gerwald Rockenschaub, Ugo Rondinone, and Steven Shearer.

"When I paint I do not think of structure or theme; what I seek is a certain 'flavour' – a rhythm of spirit and energy, so that the soul drifts in the painting, like a shadow of the mind. Everything is flat and calm. 'Form' is unimportant."— Qiu Shihua

The EarthKeepers Club is a program that focuses on serving, reflecting on, and learning about the natural world. It is a space for youth (ages 12-16) to connect with others their age that have similar interests in the environment and conservation. Through this program, we aim to make a tangible impact and have fun along the way! The EarthKeepers Club currently has no cost to join and runs from April-November, on the second Saturday of each month. We are able to offer 3 volunteer hours for high school students that participate in a program day. We are excited to welcome you to the EarthKeepers Club whether it is your first time or you have been many times before! If this interests you or if you have any questions about our programming, please reach out to cedar.haven@arocha.ca . Information Source: A Rocha Canada | eventbrite

Community Farmer Days Spend a joyful day surrounded by nature and community as you volunteer on our working, organic farm, helping us grow veg and care for wildlife. Our Community Farmer Days are brilliant fun for all ages and we provide a shared lunch for everyone who comes. The Community Farm is a community-owned, social enterprise that wants to share the joys of food and farming with you! Our fields are in a beautiful setting, overlooking Chew Valley Lake. Adults and children are welcome, there’s loads to learn and no experience is necessary. Pay what you can, free tickets are available. “ Everyone was completely lovely and it was a truly excellent day. We can’t wait to go back .” — Community Farm Day attendee What we'll be doing Longer, warmer days mean we can now celebrate the start of a new growing season. Help us to prepare the fields and get this year’s crops in the ground. 'Must read' for first time Community Farmers To comply with health and safety legislation it is important for us to have all attendees details logged onto our Mailchimp database in advance. You will only need to fill this in once. This information will be confidential and not used for any other purpose. Please click "here" to register on our database. Any questions, please email us on volunteer@thecommunityfarm.co.uk Read more about Community Farmer Days Information Source: The Community Farm | eventbrite