Ursula Biemann

Ursula Biemann is an artist, writer, and video essayist based in Zurich, Switzerland. She investigates global relations under the impact of the accelerated mobility of people, resources and information. In her earlier art and curatorial work she made space and mobility her prime category of analysis in “Geography and the Politics of Mobility” (2003), “The Maghreb Connection“ (2006), and the widely exhibited art and research project “Sahara Chronicle“ (2006-2009) on clandestine migration networks. More recently she turned to ecology, oil and water with major art projects including Black Sea Files (2005), Egyptian Chemistry (2012) and Deep Weather (2013). Her video installations are exhibited worldwide in museums and the International Art Biennials of Liverpool, Sharjah, Shanghai, Thessaloniki, Sevilla, Istanbul, and Venice.

Her research is based at the Zurich University for the Arts and she is publisher of several books, e.g. “Stuff it – the Video Essay in the Digital Age (2003), Mission Reports – Artistic Practice in the Field (2008). She is currently working on a new piece on the Ecuadorian Amazon, commissioned by Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University.

Biemann has a BFA from the School of Visual Arts and attended the Whitney Independent Study Program in New York (1988). She received a doctor honoris causa in Humanities by the Swedish University Umea and the Prix Meret Oppenheim, the national art award of Switzerland.