calendario eventi  :: 

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17/3/2015

Two Exhibitions

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid

Two Case Studies: The Im Obersteg and Rudolf Staechelin Collections
curated by: Rosario Peiró

It was not the work of artists, critics and curators alone that made the development of modern and contemporary art possible. Another factor related to both economic and social concerns intervened as a catalyst in the process. This was art collecting.

This exhibition brings together two leading collections of early modernist art that now form part of the holdings of the Kunstmuseum Basel (Basel, Switzerland), the Im Obersteg Collection and the Rudolf Staechelin Collection, offering an opportunity to enjoy works by the most reputed early modernist masters, the vast majority of which have never before been seen in Spain. It is moreover a chance to explore the phenomenon of collecting, with a focus on its centrality to the formation of modern art.

Private collections of early modernism have traditionally been studied and exhibited with an emphasis on the contemplation of the works on display, neglecting the economic, social and political implications inherent to the activity of collecting in a context like that of Europe in the first decades of the 20th century. Nevertheless, collecting is above all discursive, and may be studied as such. A collection of whatever kind is made up not only of the works it contains but also of the narratives it successfully generates. It was in this sense that Walter Benjamin regarded the collector in his Arcades Project, viewing the act of collecting as related to the desire to understand and organize theworld as a cosmos: "Perhaps in this way it is possible to concretize the secret motive that underlies collecting: the fight against dispersion. The great collector is perturbed from the outset by the dispersion and chaos that subsume everything in theworld.”

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White Fire: The Kunstmuseum Basel Modern Collection
curated by: Bernhard Mendes Bürgi, Nina Zimmer and Manuel Borja-Villel

The Kunstmuseum Basel is considered one of the finest public municipal museums in the world. The two cornerstones of its collection are the works dating from the 15th and 16th centuries, on one side, and artworks from the 19th century to the 21st, on the other, with the ensemble of the latter making it one of the most significant collections of contemporary art in Europe.

Coinciding with the closure of the Kunstmuseum Basel for the remodelling of its spaces, the Museo Reina Sofía will be showing a selection from the Kunstmuseum Basel’s important collection of modern and contemporary art, comprising more than a hundred works (paintings, sculptures, collages, photographs and videos). This selection will range in date from the late 19 th century to the present day and will aim to offer a comprehensive panorama that explains the transition from classic modern to contemporary art, including examples of Expressionism, abstract art, Constructivism, Minimalism, German Post-Expressionism and more.

This exceptional occasion will bring together works by artists of the stature of Edvard Munch, Wassily Kandinsky, Picasso, Juan Gris, Fernand Léger, Georges Braque, Le Corbusier, Dubuffet, Alberto Giacometti, Yves Tanguy, Hans Arp, André Masson, Max Ernst, Paul Klee, Piet Mondrian, László Moholy-Nagy, Hans Arp, Donald Judd, Gerhard Richter, Mark Rothko, Jasper Johns, Barnett Newman, Andy Warhol, Francis Picabia, Jean Tinguely and Pierre Huyghe.

Image: Pablo Picasso. Buveuse d’absinthe (The Absinthe Drinker), 1901. Oil on canvas, 81 x 60 cm. Im Obersteg Foundation, permanent loan to the Kunstmuseum Basel. Photography: Mark Gisler, Müllheim

Press Contact:
Concha Iglesias Phone (+34) 91 7741005 / 06 prensa1@museoreinasofia.es -
prensa3@museoreinasofia.es

Opening: Wednesday 18 March 2015

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia
Santa Isabel, 52 (Sabatini Building)
Madrid

Opening Hours:
Monday : 10:00 a.m. - 9:00 p.m.
Tuesday: close
Wednesday-Saturday: 10:00 a.m. - 9:00 p.m.
Sunday: 10:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m

General Admission: 8 euro

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