Location: Volkshaus Basel, Rebgasse 12-14
CH-4058 Basel
Exhibition dates: 16.04. - 13.11.2026
The opening exhibition by artist Timothée Calame at the Volkshaus Basel marks the start of an ongoing collaboration between Room for Art – an initiative of the WACollection – and the Liste Art Fair Basel. It heralds the launch of an ongoing exhibition series that establishes the Volkshaus Basel as an open space for artistic encounters. Curated by Nikola Dietrich, Director of Liste, the programme features two presentations, which change annually, showcasing selected national and international works within the context of the fair; it extends the fair’s impact beyond the exhibition period and creates additional visibility for key works in contemporary art.
The works of Timothée Calame (b. 1991, lives and works in Geneva), represented by Galerie Oskar Weiss, Zurich, navigate the tension between everyday reality and fiction, in which political, poetic and prosaic layers intertwine to form multi-layered narratives. In his search for new representational techniques, Calame develops a distinctive visual language in which diverse symbols and materials come together and are transformed into new contexts of meaning – a practice that shifts perceptions and subtly challenges familiar orders.
In the reception and passageway area of the Volkshaus, various elements – including water collection containers, fibre-cement planters, concrete cones, metal rods, hoses and medical containers – have been assembled into three sculptures entitled Micro Monument. The title refers to a humanised, almost body-scale dimension: the works appear as silent protagonists that have absorbed events and memories, exploring themes such as change and the often invisible structures of our shared existence. The materials used are drawn from various spheres of life—such as everyday life, care and infrastructure—and come into direct contact with one another here.
In their shifting between functional, domestic and institutional contexts, they point to an ambivalent proximity between care and control. As fragile, situational forms of monuments, the sculptures emerge less as fixed representations of cultural or political significance, and more as open condensations of memory. Thus unfolds a structure that explores the workings of our world – between existential depths and the realms of everyday experience, between public fiction and intimate perception.
In the garden area of the Volkshaus, the glass spheres made of Holophane glass, mounted on painted metal barrels, serve as sculptural lamps that transform the industrial structure into a luminous object. Under the title Variations around Pseudo-Transparency, the sculptures draw on motifs and formal languages from earlier bodies of work, including cartographic globes, decorative techniques borrowed from the psychedelic sub-genre, and found objects from urban and domestic environments. Through the interplay of light, material and perception, the apparent transparency of the glass is refracted by its prismatic structure and transformed into shifting states of light. This gives rise to objects that oscillate between function and sculpture, subtly shifting the concept of visibility. The materials and objects used appear both familiar and otherworldly – like fragments of everyday life frozen in time, pointing to cycles of use, exchange and transformation. Through their presence, these processes coalesce into a quiet narrative of constant change and the fundamental dynamics of life.
About the artist:
Timothée Calame (b. 1991, lives and works in Geneva), represented by Galerie Oskar Weiss, Zurich, has exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including: Centre d’édition contemporaine, Geneva (2025); MAMCO, Geneva (2023); Kunstverein Bielefeld, Bielefeld (2022); Weiss Falk, Zurich (2022); Edouard Montassut, Paris (2022); The 23rd Pernod Ricard Foundation Prize, Paris (2021); Kunsthaus Langenthal (2020); Weiss Falk, Zurich (2022); Edouard Montassut, Paris (2022); The 23rd Pernod Ricard Foundation Prize, Paris (2021); Kunsthaus Langenthal (2020); Weiss Falk, Basel (2020); Centre d’Edition Contemporaine, Geneva (2019); Liste Art Fair Basel, Weiss Falk, Basel (2017).
