Exhibition Kirchner Museum Davos shows top-class Ulmberg collection
Museum director Katharina Beisiegel is delighted that abstract painting is also represented in the Ulmberg Collection with works by the Russian Serge Poliakoff (1899-1969).
Image: Keystone
One of the works from the Ulmberg Collection now on display at the Kirchner Museum Davos is Red Path by the Expressionist August Macke (1887-1914). (portrait format, 1914, oil on cardboard, 51.9 x 40 cm, Ulmberg Collection)
Image: Keystone
The Kirchner Museum Davos wants to build an architecturally sophisticated extension for the permanent loan of the Ulmberg Collection.
Image: Keystone
Museum director Katharina Beisiegel is delighted that abstract painting is also represented in the Ulmberg Collection with works by the Russian Serge Poliakoff (1899-1969).
Image: Keystone
One of the works from the Ulmberg Collection now on display at the Kirchner Museum Davos is Red Path by the Expressionist August Macke (1887-1914). (portrait format, 1914, oil on cardboard, 51.9 x 40 cm, Ulmberg Collection)
Image: Keystone
The Kirchner Museum Davos wants to build an architecturally sophisticated extension for the permanent loan of the Ulmberg Collection.
Image: Keystone
The Kirchner Museum Davos is exhibiting paintings from the high-caliber Ulmberg Collection. On display are major works of expressionism, classical modernism and contemporary art from 1950 onwards. The museum hopes to acquire the collection on permanent loan.
11.10.2024, 12:01
11.10.2024, 17:21
SDA
The show "New Masterpieces. Ulmberg Collection" from October 13 to January 3 brings together outstanding works of art from the private collection, supplemented by individual works from the museum's holdings. Museum Director Katharina Beisiegel explained this to the media on Friday at the exhibition presentation.
The Kirchner Museum has the option of bringing the Ulmberg art collection to the Alpine city on permanent loan. However, the museum would have to build an extension for around 14 to 16 million Swiss francs in order to have room for the paintings, which would more than double the museum's collection.
The museum is hoping to receive four million francs from the municipality of Davos. The local electorate will decide on this at the end of November. With the exhibition and various information events, the Kirchner Museum is therefore addressing Davos residents in particular.
With the show in all five halls, the museum wants to show how well the Ulmberg collection fits into the building. "The people of Davos should see what they would get," said Beisiegel. As the on-site inspection showed, the exhibition with numerous large-format works of colorful Expressionism should also be attractive to laypeople.
From Kirchner to Bacon
The collection of German art lover Uwe Hohli, consisting of almost 100 paintings, draws concentric circles from Kirchner to the figurative painter Francis Bacon, explained Beisiegel. "It is one of the most important collections of classical modernism," the museum director is certain. For her, one of the highlights of the collection is Bacon's "Reclining Figure". More than half of the collection is on display in Davos.
The collection complements the museum's holdings very well, emphasized the director, who curated the exhibition herself. In addition to Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Ulmberg's collection includes several works by other big names from whom the museum already owns paintings.
These include Max Beckmann, Lyonel Feininger and Emil Nolde, undisputed great names of classical modernism (around 1900-1940). Other highlights include Bauhaus representative Oskar Schlemmer, the Expressionist August Macke and Ben Nicholson, one of the great British painters.
"We can show what happened after Kirchner," says Beisiegel. The show is a small tour through the history of art over the last 110 years. The common thread running through the exhibition is the polarity between figuration and abstraction.
Gigon and Guyer ready for new building
According to Beisiegel, the existing museum building from 1992, designed by the renowned architect duo Gigon and Guyer, is an "internationally renowned architectural icon". The fact that the two star architects are prepared to continue developing the museum building themselves after more than 30 years is another stroke of luck.
Should the museum actually be able to bring the collection to Davos on permanent loan for the next 30 years, it would be a "huge stroke of luck", emphasized Beisiegel. A museum director only experiences something like this once in a lifetime.
