Oskar Weiss, 19, sits on a folding chair in front of a container in the car park of a former ship-building hall in Zurich West. It may resemble a collection point for wrecked cars, but it's one of the six public spaces that are part of ‘Art and the City’.

Over the next three months, the gallery owners Sinka & Weiss are exhibiting six young artists in rotation under the title ‘Spaziergänge’ (‘Walks’) inside the container provided by the F+F School for Art and Media Design. The container is moved to a new location for every opening. “The next stop is Röntgenplatz, where we’ll have an exhibition by Dutch artist Wink Withold on his beard. That’s one I’m really looking forward to,” says Oskar.

Lovely surprises 

Most of the art objects and installations that are part of ‘Art and the City’ are like this container. You don’t see everything at first glance. Charlotte Posenenske’s minimalist rectangular steel tubes, for example, are installed high up on a building on Limmatstrasse Where they could easily be mistaken for ventilation pipes.

“The art is fully integrated into the district,” says Weiss. “You don’t come here just to see ‘Art and the City’ – you take a random walk through the area and happen upon something lovely or surprising. That’s the idea of open-air galleries, of course: to sharpen the eye for art.” Weiss makes his case even more emphatically by pointing out a stone sculpture on a disused railway viaduct. “That's the ‘grosse Liegende’ (‘Large reclining woman’) by Hans Josephsohns. The first time I saw it, I thought it was a stone that had fallen off the viaduct.” So if you want to be sure not to miss any of the art, it’s best to bring along a map or use your smart phone (www.artandthecity.ch).

”Art should be visible and accessible to everyone, even if only a small percentage of the people can afford it. That’s life.”

Art is a luxury item

Once you start looking closely, things you never noticed before suddenly become strangely interesting. Are the three macabre posters in front of the Denner supermarket an advertisement or art? They’re art: a work called ‘Toilettenpapier’ (‘Toilet paper’) by the Milanese artist Maurizio Cattelan. But the bars in front of a construction site are just what they seem to be: namely, a barrier.

Oskar Weiss still hasn’t found a work he would call his favourite. He prefers strolling aimlessly through the neighbourhood, absorbing the atmosphere. “This is the perfect place for ‘Art and the City’ – right in the middle of an area in transition. The Löwenbräu brewery building here just reopened as a residential, office and art complex, and there are a lot of galleries.” His only criticism: he feels that more time should have been taken for the individual works. “I have the feeling that ‘Art and the City’ was rushing to catch the train before it left the station.”

But he doesn’t have much time for the criticism levelled by the alternative artists who are being steadily displaced by rising rents that Zurich West is becoming commercialised and staid: “Zurich is a rich city and art is a luxury item. It’s always been that way and it's not going to change.” He’s convinced that “gallery owners want to earn money, but so do artists.” Still, he’s pleased with the range of alternative art venues like Cabaret Voltaire and the variety of public spaces, one of which he himself runs: “Art should be visible and accessible to everyone, even if only a small percentage of the people can afford it. That’s life.”

Worth a visit: