Khalil Berro

Khalil Berro
Khalil Berro in 2025
NationalitySwiss-Lebanese
Websitehttps://khalilberro.com/

Khalil Berro is a Swiss-Lebanese conceptual artist, living and working in Zürich and Bedretto.[1][2] He works across film, photography, sculpture, and installation, addressing relationalism and the powers, and desires that shape the world.[3] Through a poetic engagement in field research and environmental science, his practice interrogates the constructed nature of reality and examines instances of inverted agency.[1][4]

Work

Berro's work investigates contemporary desires for energy, power, and material objects, while examining instances in which minerals, objects, and non-human entities influence or even override human agency.[5] His practice is rooted in field expeditions and scientific collaborations,[6][7] often to remote sites, including decommissioned and active coal mines, Alpine peaks, glaciers, palm oil plantations in Indonesia, and the oil and gas fields of Zhanaozen in western Kazakhstan.[8][2][3]

One of his notable projects, Breathe, is a public art installation that re-imagines reality through the origins of the air. The work was developed in collaboration with Dr. Michael Armand Sprenger, Dr. Hanna Joos, and Prof. Dr. Heini Wernli from the Department of Environmental Systems Science at ETH Zurich.[2] The installation uses real-time calculations to trace air parcels' journeys over the past 30 days. The trajectories are displayed in a ticker-style font, accompanied by excerpts from conversations with scientists, poems, and other collected materials. The work questions human belief systems and concepts of nature[5] by connecting distant realities and events to local and immediate contexts.[9] The work was first exhibited at NOI Techpark in Bolzano, Italy, from July to August 2024.[10][11] This was followed by installations at the Embassy of Switzerland in Washington, D.C., in September 2024;[12] at the main building of ETH Zurich in Zurich, Switzerland, later that same month;[13][14] and at the Modern Art Museum Shanghai in Shanghai, China, in April 2025.[3]

The Fires We Started, first exhibited in Bedretto, Switzerland, examines the desires, and sense of estrangement associated with the materials that fuel the modern world, bringing them in dialogue with their primordial origins.[1] The work examines coal, tracing its formation back to the Carboniferous period.[15][1] Through sculptures, coal manipulations, and fieldwork, including explorations of coal mines in Switzerland, Germany, and the Svalbard archipelago, Berro investigates humanity's relationship with fossil fuels.[1]

In August 2023, Berro published Cloud Killer, a work group and book in which cloud structures were altered by launching rockets into them.[16] The work questions atmospheric ownership and humanity’s relationship with water resources, particularly in the context of technologies like cloud seeding, and has stirred mild public outrage over the implications of weather manipulation.[4]

Berro was a speaker at Swissnex Day 2024, which focused on the theme of Planetary Thinking.[16][17] In 2025, Berro participated as a member of the Swiss delegation and speaker at the Shanghai Climate Ring during Shanghai Climate Week[18] and is a recurring guest speaker at the Zurich School of Design.[19]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Keesmaat, Welmer. "Artistic Research: Khalil Berro - The Fires We Started Tique publication on contemporary art". Tique publication on contemporary art. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  2. ^ a b c Schmid, Franziska. ""BREATHE" art project: A journey to the origins of the air we breathe – Department of Environmental Systems Science | ETH Zurich". Department of Environmental Systems Science. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  3. ^ a b c Cao, Aijing. "Art Exhibits - Climate Ring Shanghai". Swissnex in China. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  4. ^ a b Wyttenbach, Kim (2023-09-12). "Khalil Berro präsentiert sein Kunstprojekt «Cloud Killer»". Aargauer Zeitung (in German). Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  5. ^ a b "Kunstprojekt ETH: Woher die Atemluft kommt". Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen (SRF) (in German). Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  6. ^ Kunz, Sarah (2022-02-21). "Künstler Khalil Berro verbindet Natur mit Technik". Badener Tagblatt (in German). Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  7. ^ Brumat, Roberto. "Ecco il respiro del mondo C'è «Breathe» a Bolzano". p. 11.
  8. ^ "About — Khalil Berro". khalilberro.com. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  9. ^ "ETH trifft Kunst - Wissenschaft im Alltag: Woher kommt unsere Luft?". Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen (SRF) (in German). Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  10. ^ "BREATHE, il respiro connette il mondo Summer at NOI ospita l'opera di Khalil Berro - NOI". NOI Spa (in Italian). Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  11. ^ "Un'installazione che monitora i movimenti dell'aria che respiriamo". Il Sole 24 ORE (in Italian). 2024-07-05. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  12. ^ Heckner, Ralf. "From the Ambassador's desk" (PDF). NEWS & VIEWS From the Embassy of Switzerland in the U.S. p. 4.
  13. ^ ""BREATHE" art project: A journey to the origins of the air we breathe". Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science. 2024-09-26. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  14. ^ Kotlarski, Sven (2024-09-30). ""BREATHE": Where does the air we breathe come from?". sgm-meteo.ch. Retrieved 2025-05-23.
  15. ^ "Khalil Berro The Fires We Started — CASA BEDRETTO". casabedretto.cargo.site. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  16. ^ a b "Swissnex Day 2024 – Artist Talk". Swissnex. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  17. ^ Erdmann, Larissa (2025-05-15). "Planetary Thinking". E2 – the news portal of the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI). Retrieved 2025-05-21.
  18. ^ "Climate Ring Shanghai". Swissnex in China. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
  19. ^ "«bili»-Talks". fsam.zh.ch. Retrieved 2025-05-18.
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