Ursula Biemann


Ursula Biemann is a Swiss video artist, curator and art theorist.
Born in Küsnacht, Biemann trained in art in Boston, Mexico and New York, graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the School of Visual Arts in 1986. From 1995 to 1998 she curated the Shedhalle Zürich, and from 2000 to 2003 she taught at the Geneva School of Art.
Biemann's video art at first addressed the topics of gender, globalization and mobility in an essayistic and documentary-like style. Her later work focuses on resources, the ecology and the climate, and uses a more critical style involving mythical elements. Her works were first noted in the international media art scene before a first exhibition in Switzerland in 2009. Her works have been exhibited internationally since 1998, and are held by several Fonds d'art contemporain in France and Switzerland, as well as by the Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou in Rennes, the Musée d'Art du Valais in Sion, and the Generali Foundation in Vienna. She received the 2009 Prix Meret Oppenheim among other awards.
Biemann's writing addresses topics such as mobility, migration, feminism, the ecology and the Anthropocene, including the ancient trans-Saharan trade routes that are now being used by migrants.