Stephan Bersier is a Swiss illustrator, graphic novel author, street artist (as Le Bestiaire), architect and bus driver.
Initially he studied architecture at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), where he graduated in 1999. He moved then towards comic books and illustration, but architecture, places and atmospheres keep a significant presence in his pictures. His unique technique, combining ballpoint pen drawing and digital mezzotint (manière noire), allows him to shape an obscure and melancholic universe reminding ancient engravings.
Besides, since 2018, following a need to make bigger pieces, to work with more physical materials, and to confront himself to the city, he realized his first street art works, under the pseudonym of Le Bestiaire. These pieces, executed mainly using stencils, show a different facet of his art, less figurative, and more focused on decorative elements, such as stylized insects, architectural or livresque patterns. However, his style is still recognisable through some elements such as a sort of dark and intemporal aestheticism, or the repetitive play of patterns and textures.
Stephan Bersier was born in 1971 in Neuchâtel, in the french-speaking part of Switzerland, from a Hungarian mother and a Swiss father. He has been living notably in Berlin, Budapest, La Chaux-de-Fonds, all particular cities that enriched his universe. He is currently living between Geneva and Lausanne, and works part time in the latter as a bus driver.