Inclusive heritage: invisibilized voices and places / CDH & HAT

Developed in collaboration with students from EPFL and ETH Zurich, the exhibition Inclusive heritage: invisibilized voices and places showcases twelve case studies conducted across Switzerland. These research projects reveal discreet, sometimes overlooked places that preserve the memory of minoritized communities and individuals without institutional representation. Together, they propose an alternative mapping of Swiss heritage, grounded in the country’s social and cultural plurality.

The exhibition is being held at EPFL as part of European Heritage Days 2025.

In 1975, the European Heritage Year adopted the slogan: “A future for our past.” Half a century later, in an era of migration, climate upheaval, and calls for greater social justice, this exhibition invites us to reconsider that shared future in light of today’s challenges. It raises an essential question: what do we choose to transmit, and in whose name? 

Across Switzerland, the exhibition examines hidden legacies often absent from official inventories: from prisons to working-class neighborhoods, to the memories of migration. Some studies highlight overlooked practices or lives without monuments, expanding our understanding of what can be regarded as heritage.

Through photographs, testimonies, and fieldwork, Mischa Engeler, Tiffanie Genilloud, Sofia Gloor, Malika Jenni, Tamara Khalil, Elisa Nadas, Anna Ozhiganova, Ernesto Pinto De Carvalho, Léa Roberts, Lili Rouveure, Luce Salvadé, and Nicolás Wittig, supported by Anna Karla de Almeida Milani, Rune Frandsen, Florence Graezer Bideau, and Anna Bórbala Hausel, offer a renewed vision of Swiss heritage: living and rooted in daily life. This collective project not only uncovers forgotten or little-known legacies; it calls for the building of a more inclusive memory that reflects the diversity of our society.

A Future for Whose Past? is an initiative led by the Chair of Built Heritage and Monument Conservation at ETH Zurich, in partnership with ICOMOS Suisse, in collaboration with the Heritage, Anthropology and Technologies (HAT) research group at EPFL, and with the support of the Federal Office of Culture. The exhibition originates from pedagogical work undertaken in the courses "Future Heritage" (ETH Zurich) and "Urban Anthropology" (EPFL).

Free access

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ACCESS:

• Metro M1, EPFL or UNIL-Sorge stop (signposted from the exit).
• TL, Bus 1, 31 or MBC 201 Pâqueret stop

• Saturday 13 September 2025, 13:00 – 14:00
• Saturday 13 September 2025, 17:30 – 18:30
• Sunday 14 September 2025, 13:00 – 14:00
• Sunday 14 September 2025, 17:30 – 18:30