Therese Weber
Therese Weber is one of the most important protagonists of Paper Art. As an artist and researcher, she has devoted herself to art and cultural history as well as to their sciences and practice. From Paper Art to the exploration of prehistoric rock carvings and site-specific installations in the desert and mountainous regions of Asia and Arabia, Therese Weber’s artistic practice displays great methodological diversity. She connects Paper Art, photography, drawing, objects and performance activities into an innovative visual language.
It is always a new challenge to create expressive textures, surfaces and shapes from the liquid mass of cellulose fibre and combine them with different concepts. Only in the rarest of cases does the artist use paper as a background. She primarily works with various raw materials from nature, constantly experimenting and developing new paper fibre materials, creating sculptural installations for indoor and outdoor spaces and going into the landscape to create fleeting and unbounded sculptures.
Growing up in Switzerland and studying in San Francisco in the early nineteen-eighties, when Paper Art first emerged, she dedicated her life’s work to this artistic practice, researching the culture of paper around the world. Her work has evolved steadily and consistently since her first experiments in abstract Paper Art —from multilayered objects to painting with liquid cellulose pulp. Her exploration of the qualities and structures of dyed pulp has resulted in increasingly complex entities. Over the years, both the fibres and the colours used have multiplied; the interplay between two-dimensional paper fibre layers and three-dimensional objects has become wilder and bolder; new elements, such as photography, drawing, and frottage have been added, the later in the context of her research project on petroglyphs; and the paper sculptures have begun to extend outdoors, into the vastness of open barren yet mystical landscapes, with increasing frequency. Her work and artistic language over the last forty years span the entire arc of her lively oeuvre, with its fascinating expression, persistence, and transformation at the same time.
Weber also values the material for its cultural associations. This applies both to the works made in her studio as well as to the many works that have appeared on expeditions, excursions and projects. Working with paper and photography – both in art and research – took her abroad very early on. She began her research trips in the USA. Since then, she spent many months working and exploring mainly in Asian countries.
Therese Weber (*1953) is a Professor Emerita at the University of Applied Science (FHNW), Basel, Switzerland. Regular lecture cycles at universities and art institutions as a visiting professor and artist in residence took her several times to Japan, Argentina and the University of Australia in Canberra (1996), among other places. From 1992-1996, she was president of the International Association of Hand Papermakers and Paper Artists (IAPMA).
She has been awarded art prizes on the occasion of the 9th International Biennale of Paper Art, Leopold Hoesch Museum in Düren, Germany (2005) and the Japan Paper Academy Award, Museum of Contemporary Art in Imadate, Japan (1995). Her works are represented in numerous national and international exhibitions, museums, public institutions, private collections, and art-in-architecture.
Weber’s book ‘The Language of Paper – A History of 2000 Years’ (2007) has become a standard reference work. Two major monographs (2017 and 2023) document the artist’s work. Her latest book, ‘Rock Art and its Legacy in Myth and Art‘, is published, together with Christoph Baumer, at Bloomsbury London in 2025. Therese Weber lives and works in Switzerland.
Credit to the Photographers
Dieter Spinnler, Wisen, CH
Elena Spasova, Sofia, BGR
Therese Weber, Arlesheim, CH