Where the City Breathes
Dominic Nahr
Situated on the linguistic border between French- and German-speaking Switzerland, Biel/Bienne is a city shaped by coexistence. It carries multiple identities without fully belonging to just one. Its urban fabric reflects decades of industry, migration, labour and transformation: factories, housing blocks, commercial streets and quiet residential areas exist side by side. The lake opens the city outward, while the centre holds the density of everyday life. Biel/Bienne is direct and open, marked by a quiet, self-assured sense of pride.
Dominic Nahr’s work emerges from an attentive immersion in this urban environment. Walking without assignment, observing without the need to define, remaining present to what unfolds: people passing, light touching buildings, ordinarygestures, moments of waiting, returning and continuing. The city appears as a sequence of situations in which public and private lives intersect. The intention is not to define Biel/Bienne, but to stay with its presence.
Produced in 2026, this documentary work was created for presentation in collaboration with Leica and forms part of the artist’s ongoing exploration of place, attention and contemporary urban life. The images compose a sensitive cartography of the everyday, where the city breathes through those who move through it, inhabit it and continually reshape it.
Leica Camera Switzerland and the Biel-based creative collective REBL present this highlight at La Poste.
Public opening on 9 May: more information here.
Supported by: REBL and Leica Camera Schweiz
Year of production: 2026
