04.12.2010 - 06.11.2011

In space and marked by time. Anna Viebrock – stage design as architecture

Anna Viebrock – stage designer, costume designer and director – is one of the most renowned, distinguished and internationally successful representatives of her field. In her spaces the foreign and the familiar equally have an effect; and she combines elements of reality in such a way that they appear to be surreal. Thereby sources of inspiration include everyday buildings and interiors of past decades, which Viebrock photographs and documents when travelling.

Based on sixteen selected stage sets – a number of which were created for Basel – the exhibition makes Viebrock’s developmental process visible: from the photographs that serve as the initial source of inspiration to the finished stage set. To do this architecture photos from the archive of Anna Viebrock will be used, as well as developmental sketches, stage design models and individual elements in a scale of 1:1. Photographs of scenes from plays and photo sequences of the most recent stage production spaces by Viebrock taken by the architecture photographer Walter Mair will provide the exhibition viewers with the possibility to image the spatial effect of the actual pieces.

A second part of the exhibition will take place in the Swiss National Library in Bern featuring the production ‘Wozuwozuwozu’ (Schauspielhaus Köln 2010).

Upcoming exhibitions

05.04. - 14.09.2025

What Was Could Be: Experiments Between Preservation and Architecture

An Exhibition by the  S AM Swiss Architecture Museum in Cooperation with the Chair of Construction Heritage and Preservation (Prof. Dr. Silke Langenberg), ETH Zurich.


Preservation is progressive: In current efforts to shift towards more sustainable building practices (known in German as the Bauwende, or ‘building turnaround’), preservation and maintenance of the existing building stock play a central role. The alteration or conversion of an existing building is considerably more resource-efficient than a comparable new build. This is leading to changes in the nature of architecture itself: where the focus used to be on new construction, building upon the built is increasingly considered the future of the discipline.

27.09. - 09.11.2025

SAY Swiss Architecture Yearbook

What defines Swiss architecture? The exhibition focuses on current construction and renovation projects with the aim of raising awareness about Swiss building culture and increase its visibility.
Curated by the S AM Swiss Architecture Museum and the magazine werk, bauen+wohnen.

29.11.2025 - 19.04.2026

Housing for Housing: The cooperative as a laboratory for coexistence

The exhibition presents cooperative housing regionally, nationally and internationally as a laboratory of non-profit-oriented cohabitation from which the entire city can benefit.