A passion project of the late Zaha Hadid has been unveiled to the world, with her exhibition design for a major retrospective of artist Kurt Schwitters opening in Zurich this week.

Schwitters was well known for his poetry, music and Dadaist-flavoured art. His most famous work is an installation called Merzbau – described by critics as “a living, inhabited, ever-expanding collage” – which spread over eight rooms in his Hanover home.

The artist was a major influence on Hadid’s often abstract oeuvre, and she had been planning to create a fully transformed gallery space inspired by Schwitters and Merzbau for Switzerland’s Galerie Gmurzynsk before her sudden death in March this year.

Hadid had previously worked with the gallery on a similar homage project celebrating the work of Russian painter Kasimir Malevich.

In the new exhibition, which will remain open until the end of September, 70 of Schwitters’ works across all media will go on display in a space specially remodelled by Hadid's studio to engage with them.

“This design process is capable of delivering an intricate order, open ended and unpredictable, but at any time highly articulate,” said Hadid’s long-time collaborator Patrik Schumacher. “It is full of contingencies, but forges a unique, path-dependent identity.”

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