Kunsthalle@ZKM

A New Look at the Museum’s Collection

The Museum is closed for extensive renovation work.
During this time, exhibitions at ZKM | Center for Art and Media and at Junge Kunsthalle take place.

ZKM

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In a few words

We are visible again: at the invitation of the ZKM | Center for Art and Media, the highlights of the Kunsthalle collection will be presented in this exhibition.

After the Kunsthalle’s closure in November 2021, at last, they can be seen again for the first time: The highlights of the Kunsthalle collection from the late Middle Ages to the late 1940s will be presented on around 2000 m². The new context also offers the opportunity for a change of perspective: the familiar works will appear in a new and different way in the galleries of the ZKM – designed by the exhibition architecture company merz merz.

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The prologue is formed by a cinematic “threshold space” by Anna Henckel Donnersmarck. The multi-channel projection visualises the actual location of the art, the abandoned building of the Kunsthalle.

After this media art work, a chronological tour develops with the popular major works by Albrecht Dürer, Hans Baldung Grien, by Rembrandt, Peter Paul Rubens and Jean Siméon Chardin, by Rachel Ruysch and Marie Guilhelmine Benoist, by Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin and Max Beckmann, Max Ernst, René Magritte as well as Fritz Winter, Otto Freundlich and Victor Vasarely.

Familiar images meet rarely shown works; the contribution of women artists is particularly highlighted and the canon of art history is expanded by new voices.

New accents in the tour are given by the Röchling Collection, which adds new highlights to the Kunsthalle collection. A selection of the more than 50 high-ranking works from the Fontana Foundation established by Dr. Hermann Röchling will be shown for the first time. Another highlight is the Stiegler Collection: A collection of over 14.000 works of 19th and early 20th century photography, parts of which are now on display.

With a digital guide, visitors can be accompanied through the exhibition by multimedia and discover other major works, such as a newly restored painting by Matthias Grünewald. Several thematic tours open up new perspectives on the presentation.