Una Szeemann

Una Szeeman (born 1976 in Locarno, Switzerland) is a Swiss contemporary artist based in Zurich, Switzerland.

Her practice has been described as engaging themes such as aura, symbolism, myth, unconscious projection, and the charged psychic life of objects. In addition to her own artistic work, she has been involved in projects related to the legacy and archive of her father, curator Harald Szeemann.  

Szeemann’s upbringing was characterized by an integration of domestic life with the radical avant-garde, situated in the rugged landscape of Tegna, Switzerland in the Swiss canton of Ticino. Raised in a converted metal factory known as "La Fabbrica," she was surrounded by her father's extensive archive of over 30,000 books and numerous art objects. In this environment, the boundary between the family home and the research institute was indistinguishable. This atmosphere, conceived as a "total work of art," exposed her daily to visiting international artists, intellectual discourse, and the ongoing development of "individual mythologies," a concept championed by her father. Influenced by both her father’s curatorial vision and her mother, Ingeborg Lüscher, Szeeman developed an acute sensitivity to the unconscious and the invisible. Her formative years were shaped less by formal instruction than by immersive exposure to creative pursuits, with the wild landscape of the Valle Maggia providing a backdrop for a life devoted to documenting human expression and the "hidden traces" of existence. These themes continue to inform her sculpture and film work.^[1]

Szeemann’s career is defined by her sustained effort to render “visible traces of invisible phenomena.” This commitment has guided her evolution from early interdisciplinary practices to a prominent role in international contemporary art.^[2] She characterizes her approach as a “wandering in the landscapes of the unconscious,” a quality evident in projects that employ evocative materials and forms to articulate emotional, ritualistic, or dreamlike states that resist verbal expression. Exhibition texts consistently emphasize her engagement with the intangible and her extensive exhibition record.^[3] In addition to her studio practice, Szeemann serves on the Swiss Federal Art Commission and the board of Cabaret Voltaire, underscoring her active role within Switzerland’s cultural landscape. Her career thus negotiates a dual trajectory: one that is introspective and oriented toward dreams and symbols, and another that situates her within major art institutions, events, and archival initiatives in contemporary art.^[4]

Szeemann’s 2003 short film Montewood Hollyverità remains a key work in her oeuvre, collapsing Monte Verità’s utopian and esoteric history into a knowingly artificial Hollywood dreamworld shaped by performance, irony, and symbolic projection. Szeemann observes to artist Amadour, “Monte Verità is a deeply layered story. It brought together people from very different backgrounds who were trying to create a new way of living — intellectually, spiritually, sexually, artistically. In a sense, they were proto-hippies.” This perspective helps explain the site's enduring resonance in her work. Its cast is strikingly cross-disciplinary, bringing together artists and cultural figures including Paul McCarthy, Udo Kier, Lawrence Weiner, Henry Vincent (artist), Jason Rhoades, as well as Pauliina Talus, Tommi Thorvildsen, and Paul Cantelon.^[5]

In 2011, the Getty Research Institute acquired Harald Szeemann’s archive, securing one of the most important curatorial archives of the twentieth century. In 2015, Una Szeemann staged an exhibition titled Pretenzione Intenzione in the Fabbrica Rosa (her father's former studio) featuring objects from his archives. This project has subsequently been presented, including at the Marciano Art Foundation in 2026.^[6]

Szeemann’s work has appeared in institutions and exhibitions including:

• Kunsthalle Winterthur (solo exhibition in 2018)
• Manifesta 11 in Zurich (2016).^[7]
• The 52nd Venice Biennale.
• The 9th Lyon Biennale.
• The 5th Busan Biennale in South Korea.
• The 3rd Contour Biennale in Belgium.