During his education two figures were very important for their influence on the artist's cinematic language: Werner von Mutzenbecher and André Lehmann.
Hannes Schüpbach has become internationally known with his 16mm films, which he has presented in some of the most important European art institutions: Centre Pompidou, Paris; Biennale de l'Image en Mouvement, Geneva; Museum Reina Sofia, Madrid; Tate Modern, London.
From the first years of his artistic career, Schüpbach also worked as painter, creating "large, connected series of paintings".
During his first solo exhibition, "Stills and Movies" at Kunsthalle Basel in 2009, a combination of his paintings and films was presented.
The films and the paintings are two idioms that Schüpbach adopts to articulate the major themes of his artistic work: the representation of time and movement and the complex processes of experiencing and remembering".