Fabrice Hyber. L’Artiste Agriculteur

For the first time in Switzerland, the Thun and Thurgau art museums are collaborating to present the extensive work of French artist Fabrice Hyber. The exhibitions and their supporting program are good examples of how art and complex themes can be made tangible in the truest sense of the word.

Stubborn, unruly, enigmatic - Fabrice Hyber would probably agree with all of these descriptions of his art. With a mischievous grin on his face, because that is exactly what the French artist intends: "Fabrice Hyber does not want to impress us with 'finished' art that we can only admire from afar," says Helen Hirsch, Director of the Kunstmuseum Thun and curator of the exhibition Fabrice Hyber. L'Artiste Agriculteur. On the contrary: "He invites us into his workshop of ideas". The trained mathematician and physicist, who later became one of the most recognized French artists, paints trees, roots, watercourses and shows nature not as something static, but as a huge, living network. "Hyber's art is like a walk in the woods with a good friend who is constantly making new, exciting discoveries along the way," continues Hirsch.

The exhibition at the Kunstmuseum Thun focuses on Fabrice Hyber as a designer and farmer. It focuses on his deep connection to nature, including his La Vallée renaturation project, where he has been cultivating a primeval forest with 300,000 trees on his parents' land since the 1990s. And it is about sowing, growing and the agricultural identity that feeds his painting. "His art is a gift to everyone who believes in a fruitful connection between people and nature," says Helen Hirsch. It also shows that a museum today can be a laboratory in which art, ecology and research come together.

In keeping with this, a small community garden outside the museum invites visitors to join in for the duration of the exhibition. Various raised beds are intended as an extension and additional learning space for Fabrice Hyber's exhibition - as a way of better understanding nature and appreciating natural products, sharing knowledge and developing new perspectives. The garden beds are part of a community urban garden project that brings together visitors, residents and families from the surrounding area.

Parallel to the program in Thun, the Kunstmuseum Thurgau is focusing on the power of transformation in its exhibition Fabrice Hyber - Homme de Terre (29.3. - 30.8.2026). The historical location of the museum, a former monastery, contrasts with Hyber's ideas of transformation. Together, the two exhibitions form a unique tour through Hyber's universe and offer a unique opportunity to experience the artist in his entirety. The joint project is accompanied by the publication Fabrice Hyber. Thun Thurgau.

Radio station in the middle of the exhibition:

The project space enter (a freely configurable room in the Kunstmuseum Thun that is accessible via the exhibition) will also be used during Fabrice Hyber. L'Artiste Agriculteur. With Töne-Ton-Werden, the Biel-based artists Mathilde and Andrea Marioni are exploring radio as an extended exhibition format with their radio project Lumpen Station. As part of this, special events such as an interview with Fabrice Hyber will be organized, which can be listened to both live and free of charge afterwards on www.lumpenstation.art.

Note: This text was translated by machine translation software and not by a human translator. It may contain translation errors.