Hugo Eckener

The architect of the Lake Geneva mists, the cartographer of feelings.

There was a time when Hugo Eckener wore a uniform. He marched in step with the Swiss Confederation, his gaze fixed on the disciplined horizon of orders. From that era, he retained a taste for territory, but not for borders. Although he dreamed of drawing maps of the world, fate decided otherwise. He laid down his arms to pick up his paintbrushes, realising that the geography he loves is the shifting and secret geography of the human soul.

The Legacy of "The Whole Universe"

It all began in the silence of a child’s bedroom, through the pages of an encyclopaedia entitled Tout l’Univers (The Whole Universe). A gift from his French grandmother, these volumes published by Fratelli Fabbri were his first museums. Hugo did not seek truth in the texts, but in the poetry of the hand-painted illustrations, where each stroke of the pen seemed to contain a whole world..

And so today, settled in Nyon, between the silvery shores of Lake Geneva and the protective peaks of the Jura, he paints. His work is a silent conversation with his masters: the colour of Augusto Giacometti and the bold, almost graphic lines of Félix Vallotton.

Resilience through light

For Hugo, painting is an act of secession. For example, where others see raw reality, he sees an architecture of emotion. If he sometimes uses a drone to overlook the earth, it is only to better grasp its perspective, and then reinvent it on paper or cardboard canvas. In this way, his painting is a refuge. It is French-speaking Switzerland after the storm, after the Covid-19 pandemic, a land that has become tender, beautiful and resilient. And his paintings, done in acrylic, sometimes in oil, are ramparts against the filth of the world and authoritarianism. They are spaces of peace deliberately kept apart from the clamour of the powerful and the violence of the greedy.

The Wealth of Little Things

Hugo Eckener does not paint for fame. He lives contrary to social norms, abandoning the comfort of secure situations for the truth of his reason for living. In the chosen precariousness of his studio in Nyon, he has found what many seek but never attain: an existence that tastes of well-being. For Hugo, painting is not a profession, it is the breath that allows him to stand tall, facing the lake, facing himself.

Portrait de l'œuvre ?

Ce qui caractérise chaque peinture de Hugo ?

L’Esthétique : un mélange de précision cartographique (lignes de fuite, structures fortes) et de douceur impressionniste.
La Palette : des tons lémaniques – bleus profonds, gris perle, verts de sapin et quelques touches de jaune solaire héritées des Nabis.
Le Support : souvent des formats longs, panoramiques, évoquant la vue d’un drone mais traitées avec l’épaisseur de la peinture à l’acrylique.