GSTAAD.- Patricia Low Contemporary is presenting Yves Scherer’s first solo show Summer Pastoral at the gallery in Gstaad. The US-based Swiss artist was born in Solothurn, growing up surrounded by the Swiss countryside and its verdant mountains. This cheeky exhibition captures his view as both an insider and outsider, as his childhood landscape is reimagined through the eyes of an adult who has moved away.
This dual experience flips Scherer’s previous bodies of work made in Europe that depict the Empire State Building, reflecting his current Manhattan life from afar and the simplified views that become iconic of certain locations. Summer Pastoral is both nostalgic and future facing, presenting an idealised version of life that connects with the positive outlook of Scherer’s mischievous practice.
Sculptures are dotted about the first floor, which build upon the forms and materials of previous pieces. A country boy plucks flowers. There is also a series of women made from granite, bronze, and onyx. Goats punctuate the space, moving from the outside to inside, with flowers on their noses. Ceramic plants are scattered about the ground. Together, these works evoke the great Swiss outdoors with knowingly wholesome wit.
Amongst these three-dimensional sculptures is one of Scherer’s ongoing lenticular works, in which images of celebrities are combined with his own personal archive, such as holiday photographs. For Summer Pastoral, British model Kate Moss is shown against an overlay of flowers. The specific celebrity is not of central importance to these pieces, rather the coming together of an interchangeable public figure with the artist’s private life.
Yves Scherer is a Swiss-born, New York–based artist whose work spans sculpture, painting, and lenticular photography. Scherer’s practice explores the blurred boundaries between intimacy and mediated, or fabricated, identity.
Yves Scherer (Swiss, b. 1987 in Solothurn, Switzerland) lives and works in New York. Scherer has exhibited internationally with recent solo exhibitions at Peres Projects, Seoul (2024); Galería Mascota, Mexico City (2023); M. LeBlanc, Chicago (2023); The Journal Gallery, New York (2023); Galleri Golsa, Oslo (2023); Galerie Eva Presenhuber, New York (2022); Galerie Guido W. Baudach, Berlin (2021); Cassina Projects, New York (2021); Kunsthaus Grenchen, Switzerland (2020); Kunstverein Wiesen, Germany (2019); Kura, Milan (2019); Basement Roma, Rome (2019); and Swiss Institute, New York (2015). His work has been featured in a number of institutional group exhibitions, including Ja, wir kopieren! Strategien der Nachahmung in der Kunst seit 1970, Kunstmuseum Solothurn, Switzerland (2023); Jahresausstellung, Kunstmuseum Olten, Switzerland (2019); New Swiss Performance Now, Kunsthalle Basel, Switzerland (2018); and New Contemporaries, Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), London (2013). In 2021, he participated in the Belgrade Biennale, curated by Ilaria Marotta and Andrea Baccin. Additionally, Scherer has received numerous awards including the Swiss Art Award at Art Basel in 2015. His work has entered several collections, including Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland; Portland Museum of Art, Portland; Kunstmuseum Olten, Switzerland; and Kunsthaus Grenchen, Switzerland.
