Schiess came from Basel where he was educated. He visited Ernst Ludwig Kirschner in Davos who was an influence on Schiess's early work. He then met Paul Klee and went to Dessau to work at the Bauhaus with Wassily Kandinsky. In the 1930s he was in Paris where he shared a studio with Max Ernst and developed his geometric style of painting and became a member of the "abstraction creation" group, with Arp, Mondrian etc. At the outbreak of WW II Schiess returned to Switzerland where he became a prominent figure