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9/6/2006

Kunstraum Grasslin

Sammlung Grasslin, St. Georgen

With the KUNSTRAUM GRASSLIN and the RAUME FUR KUNST in St. Georgen in the Black Forest, the Grasslin Foundation is opening a new form of collector's museum. The inauguration of the new KUNSTRAUM GRASSLIN building will take place on 10th June 2006 shortly before the start of Art Basel. Works by Mike Kelley, Martin Kippenberger and Albert Oehlen will be shown here. An overview of the Grasslin collection will be presented parallelly in the RAUME FUR KUNST.

In the field of contemporary art, a series of notable private collections has emerged over the past few years that quite characteristically reflects the direct contact of the collectors with the artists and their art works. The Grasslin family belongs to this circle of ambitious collectors. Unlike other private collections, the Grasslin collection can be seen rather as a group venture, a type of collective, comprising the five family members - Anna, Barbel, Thomas, Sabine and Karola Grasslin - and reflecting the individual positions of those involved.

The roots of the Grasslin collection go back to the 1970s, when the parents, Dieter and Anna Grasslin, began compiling works of the German Informal. The fact that Dieter and Anna Grasslin gathered art works, that today incorporate classical, art-historical value, speaks for the courage and far-sightedness of the collectors. In 1981, their children Barbel, Thomas, Sabine and Karola began collecting art works of the 1980s. They again focused their attention immediately on contemporary art, expressing their belief in its power, but also their need to address the new. It was a risky undertaking, for the art that they decided upon was by no means agreeable, and definitely controversial. In fact, works by Werner Buttner, Martin Kippenberger and Albert Oehlen, in addition to sculptures of Isa Genzken, Hubert Kiecol, Georg Herold or Meuser, were regarded as bulky, cynical or even pretentious; works that contradicted the middle-class understanding of contemporary art through irony and disavowal. Since the beginning of the 1990s, the collection has been extended to include international young works of art by e.g. Kai Althoff, Cosima von Bonin, Tom Burr, Mark Dion, Michael Krebber, Simon Dybbroe Moller, Christian Philipp Muller, Vincent Tavenne and Jan Timme, dealing with conceptual issues and relation to place.

The concept of the collection presentation focuses on integration with the local town structure - the new KUNSTRAUM GRASSLIN building will be accompanied by the RAUME FUR KUNST project, that since 1995 uses empty shop premises and former retail businesses as exhibition venues. The visit to the museum thus involves a walk through the town of St. Georgen. The KUNSTRAUM GRASSLIN, the storehouse and the “Kippy's" restaurant were designed by the Cologne architect Lukas Baumewerd. Three independ- ent structures combine to form an ensemble. Each cube is assigned a clear function (exhibition, com- munication / gastronomy, storage). It is planned to regularly present artistic works from the collection here in the exhibition room and in the external RAUME FUR KUNST.

The new building is located in the heart of a typical Black Forest industrial town. The large forecourt with the restaurant and the open display window front, reflecting the idea of the RAUME FUR KUNST, serve as a warm welcome to citizens and tourists arriving and travelling through St. Georgen and any- body interested in art.

The Grasslin Foundation was founded in the year 2004 by the family Grasslin to support their exhibition activities. All family members are united by their personal relationship with the place. “Beyond the pictur- esque Black Forest idyll, it is planned to provide the community with impulses from the KUNSTRAUM ensemble. We hope to have a lively house that will also entice guests from outside to visit the town."
(the Grasslin family)

Press office
Kathrin Luz Communication Neumann Luz Cooperations Lubecker Strasse 11 50668 Koln Tel. + 49 (0) 221.9235987 Fax + 49 (0) 221.9235988

SAMMLUNG GRASSLIN Bahnhofstrasse 64a 78112 St. Georgen - Germany

open to the public from 15 june 2006:
thursday: 17 - 21 h
saturday: 12 - 18 h
sunday: 12 - 18 h

stampa

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