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openinghours.days.long.tuesday Open till openinghours.days.long.sunday openinghours.openfromto.long

openinghours.days.long.monday closed

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Carnival Monday 01.11.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Shrove Tuesday 11.11.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Saint Joseph 08.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Good Friday 24.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Easter 25.12.2023 closed

Easter Monday 26.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Labour Day 31.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Mother´s Day 01.01.2024 closed

Ascension Day 02.01.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Whitsun 06.01.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Corpus Christi 08.02.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Whit Monday 12.02.2024 closed

Swiss National Holiday 13.02.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Assumption Day 19.03.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

All Saints´ Day 29.03.2024 closed

Saint Martin 31.03.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Immaculate Conception 01.04.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Christmas Eve 01.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Christmas 09.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

St. Stephen´s Day 12.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

New Year´s Eve 19.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

New Year´s Day 20.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Saint Berchtold 30.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Epiphany 01.08.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

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Opening times
Museum

openinghours.days.long.tuesday Open till openinghours.days.long.sunday openinghours.openfromto.long

openinghours.days.long.monday closed

Special opening times

Carnival Monday 01.11.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Shrove Tuesday 11.11.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Saint Joseph 08.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Good Friday 24.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Easter 25.12.2023 closed

Easter Monday 26.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Labour Day 31.12.2023 openinghours.openfromto.long

Mother´s Day 01.01.2024 closed

Ascension Day 02.01.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Whitsun 06.01.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Corpus Christi 08.02.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Whit Monday 12.02.2024 closed

Swiss National Holiday 13.02.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Assumption Day 19.03.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

All Saints´ Day 29.03.2024 closed

Saint Martin 31.03.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Immaculate Conception 01.04.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Christmas Eve 01.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Christmas 09.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

St. Stephen´s Day 12.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

New Year´s Eve 19.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

New Year´s Day 20.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Saint Berchtold 30.05.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

Epiphany 01.08.2024 openinghours.openfromto.long

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Made in Witzerland – A Guide to Swiss Humour

Forum of Swiss History Schwyz | 9.6.2020 - 24.1.2021
published on 8.6.2020

What makes us Swiss laugh? And what do others find funny about us? The exhibition «Made in Witzerland - A Guide to Swiss Humour» at the Forum of Swiss History Schwyz explores what is at the heart of Swiss humour, from political satire to inappropriate jokes. From 9 June 2020 to 24 January 2021 the exhibition displays Swiss humour in all its facets with the help of multimedia presentations.

Wit and humour come in many shapes and forms. Jokes can be fierce, political, nasty, harmless, daring, even dirty at times. They are commonplace, but rarely banal. The multimedia exhibition «Made in Witzerland» takes a look at the funny side of Switzerland – featuring caricatures from the last three centuries, contemporary cartoons, and celebrated comical figures such as HD Läppli and Clown Grock. In our TV lounge we show clips from popular Swiss comedy series and movies. «Made in Witzerland» also addresses everyday humour, Swiss stereotypes and clichés, as well as socially and politically improper jokes. At the same time, it looks at the differences between male and female humour and investigates how children view and deal with irony and situational humour, all trenchantly presented in a surprising scenography.

Under the motto «how typical Switzerland ticks», the editorial team of the satirical magazine Nebelspalter and the Forum of Swiss History Schwyz invited a number of famous Swiss cartoonists to create their own, never shown before images of present-day Switzerland. These works, too, are on display in the exhibition.

Satire, wit, and humour are rarely the subject of an exhibition.
However, just like all other hallowed traditions and rituals, jokes make up part of a country’s intangible cultural heritage, reinvented and handed down through common parlance on an everyday basis. The exhibition «Made in Witzerland» lends a face to Swiss humour and makes it visible and tangible to viewers, thereby eliciting a smile or even a loud laugh from old and young alike.

Especially in view of the trying times the country faces under the coronavirus, the exhibition offers a refreshing counterpoint and reveals how fluid the boundary between seriousness, humour, and satire can be under difficult circumstances.

Images

Visual of the exhibition «Made in Witzerland»

© Swiss National Museum

Entrance to the exhibition «Made in Witzerland»

© Swiss National Museum

Oversized, hand-drawn cartoon by Marina Lutz at the entrance

© Swiss National Museum

The satirical magazine «Nebelspalter» within the exhibition

© Swiss National Museum

Humour does not stop at art – view of the exhibition

© Swiss National Museum

Clips from popular Swiss comedy series and movies are shown in the TV lounge

© Swiss National Museum

Playground: children’s humour and the spirit of the canton (countless are the jokes of one part of the country about the other)

© Swiss National Museum

The internationally known caricaturist CHAPPATTE (* 1967) with politically pointed cartoons about world affairs

© Swiss National Museum

Entry from 18 years: Women’s jokes about men, and men’s jokes about women in the «toilets» in the middle of the exhibition

© Swiss National Museum

Press contact Forum of Swiss History Schwyz

+41 41 819 60 18 medien.fsg@nationalmuseum.ch