Arte-WallhoffARTE–WALLHOFFBASEL · SINCE 1998
Detail of an artwork by illuloulou with two faces
01 / 05
Pink portrait artwork by illuloulou
02 / 05
Portrait with violet hair by illuloulou
03 / 05
Blue portrait artwork by illuloulou
04 / 05
Portrait with sunglasses by illuloulou
05 / 05

CURRENT EXHIBITION · BASEL

CURRENT EXHIBITION

illuloulouL’Art de RêverThe Poetic Universe of illuloulou

SINCE 1998

Arte‑WallhoffSpace for Contemporary Art

01 / 09
Artwork installed in the Arte-Wallhoff gallery
GALLERY SPACE · 01 / 05
Visitors in conversation during an art event
ART EVENT · 02 / 05
Visitors and artworks in the gallery space
ART EVENT · 03 / 05
Installation view inside Arte-Wallhoff
EXHIBITION VIEW · 04 / 05
Guests at an Arte-Wallhoff art event
ART EVENT · 05 / 05

Art Beyond Borders.
Kunst überschreitet Grenzen.

BASEL · CONTEMPORARY ART

Ein Raum für
zeitgenössische Kunst.

Arte-Wallhoff ist ein unabhängiger Raum für zeitgenössische Kunst. Wir vertreten internationale Positionen und fördern kulturellen Dialog durch Ausstellungen, Forschung und langfristige Zusammenarbeit.

DIE ARTE-WALLHOFF PRINZIPIEN

01

Künstlerische Exzellenz und konzeptionell fundierte Arbeit

02

Langfristige Projekte: Forschung, Experiment und Entwicklung

03

Dialog zwischen Künstler:innen und Sammler:innen über Kontinente hinweg

04

Kulturelle Identität und Vielfalt der künstlerischen Ausdrucksformen

05

Orte, an denen Menschen Kunst, Ideen und einander begegnen

06

Kunst, die unser Verständnis menschlicher Erfahrung vertieft

02 — UNSERE HALTUNG

Offenheit.
Neugier.
Exzellenz.

01

Kultureller Dialog

Zeitgenössische Kunst verbindet Kulturen, Generationen und Disziplinen – als universelle Sprache für neue Perspektiven.

02

Internationale Perspektive

Wir begleiten Künstler:innen aus aller Welt, deren Arbeiten zu einem gemeinsamen kulturellen Gespräch beitragen.

03

Langfristige Beziehungen

Vertrauen, Wissen und gegenseitiger Respekt prägen unsere Arbeit mit Kunstschaffenden, Sammler:innen und Institutionen.

03 — AUSGEWÄHLTE POSITIONEN

Künstler:innen

Marianna ChanelParis

Otto UrwylerSchweiz

Alejandro MirandaEl Salvador

Peter GospodinovBulgarien

Aktion-DirectDeutschland

04 — AUSSTELLUNGSARCHIV

09.10.2025—10.01.2026

Lesley
Schiff

Flora, Fauna &
Shimmering Worlds

In leuchtenden digitalen Kompositionen lässt die New Yorker Künstlerin Fische durch abstrakte Gewässer gleiten und botanische Formen in elektrisierenden Farbräumen aufgehen.

COM.TR 1, Trio-Mono-Photo-Print von Lesley SchiffCOM 1, Mono-Photo-Print von Lesley SchiffDOU 1, Duo-Mono-Photo-Print von Lesley Schiff

OUR TEAM

Ruben Sharif

Ruben Sharif

CIO / Programme & Art Relations

Damien Schaerer

Damien Schaerer

Co-Gallerist & Art Relations

Carl J. Heim

Carl J. Heim

PR & Legal Relations

Natasha Carnelos

Natasha Carnelos

Social Media Relations

05 — SUPPORT OUR ART PROJECTS

01

Become a Patron

Patrons accompany individual projects over years: research, travel and publications. The dialogue stays personal.

02

Sponsorship

Sponsorship of an exhibition or project – visible, clearly bounded and editorially independent.

03

Corporate Partner

Partnerships with companies that understand culture as part of their responsibility grow from the programme.

04

Donations

Unrestricted contributions support the ongoing work of the space and its projects.

05

Foundations

Foundations that wish to support research, dialogue and cross-border work are invited to contact us.

06

Friends of Arte-Wallhoff

Friends keep the space open for exhibitions, conversations and a regular circle in Basel.

06 — VISIT

Arte‑Wallhoff
Space for Contemporary Art

ADRESSE

Klosterberg 17
CH–4051 Basel
Schweiz

ÖFFNUNGSZEITEN

Di–Fr 10:00–18:00
Sa 10:00–16:00

KONTAKT

+41 79 308 53 43
arte-wallhoff@bluewin.ch

INSTAGRAM

@artewallhoff_basel ↗

07 — KONTAKT

Contact

DIREKTION

Arte-Wallhoff GmbH
arte-wallhoff@bluewin.ch

ADRESSE

Klosterberg 17
CH–4051 Basel
Schweiz

TELEFON / WHATSAPP

+41 79 308 53 43

08 — NEWSLETTER

Newsletter

Kuratierte Hinweise zu Ausstellungen und Projekten.

ANMELDEN
Arte‑WallhoffEXHIBITION ARCHIVE

04 — EXHIBITION ARCHIVE

Past exhibitions

Select an exhibition to discover the artist and available works.
    Arte‑WallhoffARTIST DOSSIER

    ARTIST DOSSIER · NEW YORK

    Lesley
    Schiff

    Painting with light

    Lesley Schiff (b. 1951, USA) is a New York artist and pioneer of colour xerography. Since the late 1970s, she has treated photocopiers and laser printers as painterly instruments, constructing images through light, movement and layered reproduction.

    Discover the practice ↓Download PDF ↓
    Works by Lesley Schiff arranged in her studio
    Works in the studio · New York

    01 — BIOGRAPHY

    A painter who found
    a new kind of brush.

    Schiff’s relationship with art began in Chicago. Her mother studied at the Art Institute of Chicago, and Schiff entered its Junior School at the age of seven. She later studied painting at the Institute before moving to New York in 1974.

    In New York, access to an early colour copier transformed her practice. Rather than using the machine simply to reproduce an image, she worked directly on its glass surface—arranging objects, moving them during exposure and using light as an active material.

    Between 1979 and 1981, Schiff developed SEASONS, a portfolio of 24 images. The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired the series in 1981, at a time when the museum had no established category for this new image-making process.

    Her work has since moved between colour xerography, laser imaging, photography and interactive digital projects. Across these changing technologies, the central questions remain remarkably consistent: how images construct memory, identity, power and our perception of the world.

    “I never intended to stop painting. I just decided to start painting with a modern tool.”— Lesley Schiff

    02 — ARTISTIC PRACTICE

    Image, object,
    light and time.

    Schiff’s process sits between painting, photography and performance. The machine records not only the object, but the artist’s physical gesture and the duration of an exposure.

    01

    Painting with light

    The copier’s scanning beam becomes a source of illumination and a moving brush. Colour is built optically rather than mixed on a palette.

    02

    Process as image

    Objects shift while they are scanned. Streaks, blur, dust and particles are retained as evidence of time, touch and the machine’s translation.

    03

    Layered symbols

    Found images and cultural signs are isolated, repeated and superimposed. Their familiar meanings become unstable when placed in new constellations.

    04

    Expanded digital space

    From prints to interactive works, Schiff uses technology to open images rather than close them—to invite movement, comparison and discovery.

    SEASONS

    A 24-image portfolio that established the colour copier as a medium for original image-making.

    FACE VALUE / MONEY TALKS

    Money, status and power are examined through the symbols and portraits embedded in currency.

    ANGELS

    Historical and contemporary angelic motifs meet commercial culture and the visual language of everyday life.

    EYE LEVELS / DISTANT SYSTEMS

    Changing points of view connect the human body, architecture, geography and the cosmos.

    DO NOT PRETEND

    A career-spanning interactive project arranged as an exploratory visual system inspired by the periodic table.

    03 — SELECTED CHRONOLOGY

    Five decades of
    experimentation.

    1. Born in the United States.

    2. Begins art education in the Junior School of the Art Institute of Chicago; later studies painting at the Institute.

    3. Moves to New York. Exhibition at the Aldrich Museum.

    4. Exhibits at 3 Mercer Street, New York.

    5. Exhibits at The Kitchen, New York.

    6. Basel Art Fair and Mike Steiner Gallery.

    7. Creates the 24-image SEASONS portfolio.

    8. The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquires SEASONS.

    9. Exhibition at the Chicago Cultural Center.

    10. Face Value shown at Rockefeller Townhouse, New York.

    11. Work enters the collection of The Museum of Modern Art, New York.

    12. Work enters the Royal Collection, Buckingham Palace; exhibitions with Arte‑Wallhoff and Alexia Goethe Fine Art.

    13. Work enters the collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art.

    14. Included in the Whitney Museum exhibition Experiments in Electrostatics.

    15. Presented at The Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Bob Dylan project receives editorial attention in Boston.

    16. Work enters the collections of Arts Brookfield and the Fleming Museum of Art.

    17. Launches Do Not Pretend: 1978–2022; Arte‑Wallhoff presents The Angelic Collection.

    18. Arte‑Wallhoff presents Money Talks.

    19. Arte‑Wallhoff presents Flora, Fauna & Shimmering Worlds.

    04 — ATELIER IMPRESSIONS

    The working
    environment.

    These views show the intimate scale of Schiff’s working process: images gathered in sequences, prints tested in proximity and the studio floor becoming an active field of comparison.

    Works by Lesley Schiff arranged on a studio table
    Works arranged in the studio
    Lesley Schiff studio view with artworks arranged on the floor
    Atelier view · New York, 2017

    05 — WORKS IN CONTEXT

    From the studio
    to the institution.

    Schiff’s prints operate both as autonomous images and as parts of larger visual systems. Installed in sequence, they create constellations across time, technology and cultural memory.

    Lesley Schiff works installed in a museum gallery
    Installation impression
    Visitors viewing Lesley Schiff works in a museum gallery
    Works in an institutional setting

    06 — RECOGNITION & CONTEXT

    An early digital
    language.

    From museum acquisition to exhibitions and editorial coverage, Schiff’s work has been recognised as a foundational contribution to electrostatic and digital image-making.

    Metropolitan Museum of Art article about Lesley Schiff
    The Metropolitan Museum of ArtAcquisition and digital-art history
    Article about Lesley Schiff's Distant Systems project
    Distant SystemsKansas City presentation
    Boston Magazine article about Lesley Schiff's Bob Dylan project
    Boston MagazineBob Dylan visual biography
    The FWA feature about Lesley Schiff's Bob Dylan project
    The FWAInteractive project recognition

    Selected collections

    The Metropolitan Museum of Art · Whitney Museum of American Art · The Museum of Modern Art · Royal Collection, Buckingham Palace · Yale University · Fleming Museum of Art · New York Public Library · David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art

    Corporate & private collections

    Goldman Sachs · Chase · JP Morgan · General Electric · Canon USA · Columbia Records · Mick Jagger · New York Telephone

    Selected exhibitions

    Basel Art Fair · The Kitchen · Chicago Cultural Center · Rockefeller Townhouse · Whitney Museum of American Art · The Metropolitan Museum of Art · Weinberger Fine Art · Arte‑Wallhoff

    LESLEY SCHIFF AT ARTE‑WALLHOFF

    Explore the exhibitions
    and available works.

    Download PDF ↓
    • The Angelic Collection
    • Money Talks
    • Flora, Fauna & Shimmering Worlds
    Arte‑WallhoffBASEL · SINCE 1998

    ARTWORK CATALOGUE

    Works from the exhibition

    0 available