André Evard (1876 - 1972)
30.11.2025 - 25.01.2026
When color meets silence: André Evard at Galerie Messmer
From Sunday, November 30, 2025, Galerie Messmer will open its doors for a fascinating journey of discovery through the landscapes of André Evard (*1876 – † 1972) – one of the most visionary Swiss artists of the 20th century.
In keeping with the coming contemplative Christmas season, the rooms are transformed into a world full of magic, light and incomparable beauty.
This finely curated exhibition presents works on display for the first time that reveal Evard’s unique ability to transform nature in their sensual effect. Discover the snow-covered winter landscapes, tranquil lakes and delicate floral still lifes that the artist produced over a creative period of more than 80 years. The majority of these works will be exhibited in 2026 on the occasion of André Evard’s 150. Anniversary will also be on display at the renowned Powerlong Museum in Shanghai, China, marking another milestone that will make Evard’s work even more international in art history. This is therefore the only opportunity to see many of these unique works before they go on a world tour.
The works captivate through their color complexity and the design of the oil paints on the picture carrier. The eye wanders not only over the motifs of mountainous Jura landscapes or finely arranged still lifes, but also over an artistically modeled color relief. The exhibition brings together major works from the years around 1917 to 1971 and thus shows a wide range of André Evard’s diverse creative periods.
Evard was influenced by the surroundings of La Chaux-de-Fonds, which is around 1000 meters above sea level, making it one of the highest towns in Switzerland. It was here that he experienced the glowing, dramatically painted sunrises and sunsets that appear again and again in his paintings.
Visitors can look forward to an exhibition that appeals to both the heart and the mind – a journey through space, color and emotion that will linger for a long time.
preview
Yoshiyuki Miura (*1958)
01.02.2026 - 12.04.2026
Yoshiyuki Miura is coming to Riegel – and is bringing a whole waterfall with him. The exceptional Japanese artist, twice winner of the international André-Evard-Prize within 15 years and most recently winner of the 7th André-Evard-Prize, is now celebrating his first solo exhibition at Galerie Messmer.
Miura’s works are not quiet pictures for the background – they draw you into the room with force, rhythm and meditative power. He works with unusual materials such as steel, rice, lenses, beans and light to create fascinating, poetic spatial and wall objects.
His famous waterfall in particular looks like a natural phenomenon on steel: a visual thundering, somewhere between Japanese aesthetics, inner peace and raw energy.
Made from countless stainless steel pins, it not only impresses with its monumental presence, but also marks a special moment in the history of Galerie Messmer: at 6.60 meters long and 1.80 meters high , it is the largest work ever exhibited in the gallery.
With this rice painting made from around 10,000 grains of rice, he won first place at the 7th International André-Evard Prize in 2025, which can also be experienced in this exhibition with a new presentation.
In addition to the material of rice, he also uses beans and lentils, thus referring to the cultural roots of the East, while the three-dimensional arrangement assigns his works to Western art. This creates a dialog between Eastern material symbolism and Western formal language.
Miura’s spherical works made of stainless steel wires and light tie in with the quiet materiality of the rice painting, transforming the theme into a spatial and light-based form.
Miura’s spherical works made of light and thousands of individually colored stainless steel pins offer a very special symbiosis of light, color and materiality. For a single light object, the artist uses around 3,000 to 4,000 stainless steel pins to create a floating, spherical structure. The interplay of light, color and material dissolves fixed contours and actively incorporates the space into the work. The spheres appear both technically precise and poetic at the same time , thus thematizing the tension between order, movement and immaterial appearance.
The exhibition offers the opportunity to experience Miura’s multi-layered work in its quiet intensity, in which calm and inner strength condense into a palpable energy, and to enter a space that invites reflection and personal interpretation. Let us embark on this unique journey around the world together.
past exhibitions
Chrisitane Grimm – Floating spaces
29.06. – 14.09.2025
Alexander Höller ECHO
21.09. – 23.11.2025
Our artists
Michael Urtz
About the artist The artist, born in 1952, studied from 1972 to 1979 at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart with Prof. KRH
Zhuang Hong-Yi
About the artists Zhuang Hong Yi’s works, on the other hand, take us into a world of intoxication of flowers and colors. Born in Sichuan