Renzo Piano Building Workshop   Paris

The exhibition is devoted to previously unpublished construction-site documents from the Zentrum Paul Klee in Bern, Switzerland. The Zentrum Paul Klee, set amid green hills with the silhouette of the Alps in the background and not far from the cemetery where Klee is buried, was designed to pay tribute to the artist.

The idea behind the building was to capture the « spirit of the sculptor » and to work with the topography. The museum thus takes on the exact form of the hills and blends perfectly into its surroundings. Silent and peaceful, the museum is in perfect harmony with Klee’s work. It consists of a sequence of three spaces of decreasing size, linked by a roof forming three hills that seem to have been cut out of the landscape. From the museum’s entrance, visitors reach the first space, devoted to exchange, with an auditorium, conference room, and educational area ; the second space is devoted to Klee’s work and temporary exhibitions ; the third is the research and study center.

(Original text of 2006, machine translated in 2026.)