To mark the launch of the book “Olivia Heussler. Zurich, Summer 1980”, photographer Olivia Heussler is presenting a solo exhibition at Perla-Mode featuring original photographs from the hot Zurich summer of 1980. Young photographer Olivia Heussler was there with her camera right from the start. As an activist in the movement, she always photographed directly and from the heart of the action, wanting to capture everything and find her own visual language as a photographer.
In the summer of 1980, a youth in upheaval challenged the conservative, complacent and mothballed Zurich. The latter reacted largely with incomprehension and irritation, and ultimately with repression. Olivia Heussler’s photographs show us a provincial Swiss city in a state of emergency – demonstrations, riots, police operations and the legendary autonomous youth centre (AJZ), which opened in June 1980, was cleared, occupied and reopened, and finally demolished in March 1982 under heavy police protection. The documentary photos show violence, but also activist actions with Dadaist madness and joyful anarchy.
The youth unrest shaped a generation and ultimately changed Zurich forever. The cultural life of this city is unimaginable in every respect without the influence of “d’Bewegig “(the movement), which demanded free space for young people and non-established culture. An off-space such as Perla-Mode or alternative spaces and institutions such as the Theaterhaus Gessneralle or the Rote Fabrik cultural centre are now generally accepted and important parts of a multi-faceted and lively cultural life in the city of Zurich.
Thirty years after the youth riots, the exhibition at the message salon is more like a collection of contemporary documents. Olivia Heussler presents her personal selection of original vintage prints that meet her artistic standards in the large room at Perla-Mode.
Some of her published photographs already achieved cult status during the ‘Bewegig’ era and were used in the scene for flyers, collages and magazines. On the first floor of Perla-Mode, Olivia Heussler presents a documentary exhibition based on her large collection of flyers, booklets, fanzines, magazines and posters from the ‘Bewegig’ movement, in which her photographs appear in repurposed form.