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Stephan Zimmerli

Stephan Zimmerli is a transdisciplinary artist working at the intersection of architecture, scenography, visual arts, and music. Trained as a scenographer at ENSAD and as an architect under Peter Zumthor at the Accademia di Mendrisio in Switzerland, he has designed over 90 theatrical scenographies with “La Boutique Obscure,” co-founded the group Moriarty as a double bassist and guitarist, and created hybrid architectures combining space, sound, and narrative in lightweight structures. His visual work, exhibited in London, Paris, Florence, Venice, and Berlin, has recently evolved toward micro-architecture and performance projects, where drawing materializes in real time mental spaces, invisible memories, and the fragmented recollections of people in exile.

Inspired by the 15th-century Memoria Arteficiosa and Studioli, the Studiolo de l’Exil is a micro-architecture and mental space where the artist invites people living in exile to share memories of a place they have lost. During two-hour sessions, relying solely on memory, they collaboratively reconstruct an image of these distant places—through listening, dialogue, and large charcoal drawings that attempt to capture and recreate these mental visions, triggering forgotten details and recollections. The final result is a panoramic drawing, a shared horizon: the collective memory of exile, materialized and housed within the walls of the studiolo.

The Studiolo de l’Exil project originated in Florence, Italy (Murate Art District), and reinvents itself in each location it visits (Paris, Berlin, Lyon, Caen, Avignon…). Within the context of the FAST cultural district and the evolving urban landscape of Romainville, the project seeks out exiled communities and the mental spaces that constitute the social and urban fabric of the city. The drawn interviews and the materialization of memory through drawing and architecture create an entry point—a bridge between the cultural district and the surrounding residents.

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