EXHIBITIONS

The Bundeskunsthalle is closed
until 31 January 2021

In accordance with the requirements of the Corona Protection Ordinance of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, the Bundeskunsthalle is closed until 31 January 2021.

The closure means that all planned events, guided tours and educational programs will not take place in the specified period.

Current information can be found on our website and our social media channels.

Max Klinger
and the Artwork of the Future

16 October 2020 to 5 April 2021

Max Klinger (1857–1920), a pioneer of German Symbolism, was one of the most prominent and controversial artists in the international art world around 1900. His work comprises paintings, sculptures and a large and varied body of prints. Inspired by Wagner’s idea of the gesamtkunstwerk, Klinger sought to overcome the division of the creative disciplines and to fuse painting, sculpture, architecture and even music into a single harmonious whole.
His ‘singular fantasticism’ and his vividly imagined, technically brilliant prints earned him great admiration early on in his career. In his paintings and sculptures, he turned away from the stale academicism and idealisation that governed figuration at the time and embraced a daring naturalism in the depiction of the naked human body that shocked his contemporaries. His novel approach played an important role in the modern conceptualisation of the human figure.
At the heart of the exhibition, which presents some 200 works from all areas of Klinger’s practice, is the monumental Beethoven sculpture of 1902. This extraordinary work is widely regarded as the epitome of the late romantic veneration of the composer and forms a spectacular visual highlight to mark the close of the Beethoven anniversary year of 2020.

In cooperation with the Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig

Hannah Arendt
and the 20th Century

Provisional dates 2 February to 16 May 2021

The twentieth century simply cannot be understood without Hannah Arendt.
Amos Elon, journalist and writer

Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) was one of the most important political thinkers of her time. Controversial and opinionated, she commented on current events. In her judgements she did not follow any tradition or political direction. ‘Thinking without a banister,’ she called it.
The Jewish writer who had fled Nazi Germany coined the terms we still use to describe two central concepts: ‘totalitarianism’ and ‘banality of evil’. She wrote about anti-Semitism, the situation of refugees, the Eichmann trial, Zionism, the US political system, racial segregation, student protests and feminism.
Not one of these issues has been resolved. Thus, the exhibition presents a life and work that reflect the history of the 20th century and that have lost none of their relevance and explosive power. The presentation is not biographical, but sheds light on Arendt as a public intellectual: the disputes she engaged in, the insights she shared, the errors she was subject to. Hannah Arendt’s ideas continue to challenge our own judgement, even in current political contexts, especially at a time when democracy is in grave danger of being undermined in many places around the world.

An exhibition of the Deutsches Historisches Museum in cooperation with the Bundeskunsthalle

Aby Warburg: Mnemosyne Atlas
The Original

26 February to 23 May 2021

In the 1920s, the art historian and cultural theorist Aby Warburg developed his Bilderatlas Mnemosyne. For this project of a ‘picture atlas’, he studied the interplay of images from different periods and contexts, ranging from antiquity and the Renaissance to contemporary culture. To highlight universally recurring visual themes and patterns, Warburg juxtaposed images of works of art from the Middle East and Europe with contemporary newspaper clippings and advertisements.
His method set new standards: for the first time, motifs and images were looked at across epochs. His work transcended the disciplinary boundaries between art history, philosophy and anthropology and laid the foundations for today’s disciplines of image and media studies.
To this day, Warburg’s approach remains inspirational and offers alternative routes through our visually and digitally dominated world. Consisting of 63 large panels, the exhibition is the first to present a nearly complete reconstruction of the last documented version of the Atlas with Warburg’s original visual material.

Curated by Axel Heil and Roberto Ohrt with the Warburg Institute, in cooperation with the Bundeskunsthalle
Produced by Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin

Dress Code
Are you playing fashion?

21 May to 12 September 2021

How did you choose the clothes you are wearing today? Designer dress or jeans, suit or sweatpants, pullover or uniform – every culture, society and group has its own dress codes. They set the framework, but they leave us room to come up with our individual take on the rules. Sometimes, we make our choices depending on how we feel. At others, the decision is based on the occasion for which we dress – or the person we want to meet. Moreover, we want our clothing style to give expression to our personality. After all, fashion is not just the act of wearing clothes, it is also the act of seeing and being seen – nowadays preferably by a vast audience on social networks.
Dress Code – the hugely successful exhibition from Japan – shines a light on fashion as a reflection of society and the zeitgeist, all the way to today’s stylistic plurality. It presents a global overview of present-day fashion, especially streetwear, by celebrated designers such as Giorgio Armani, Chanel, COMME des GARÇONS, Issey Miyake, Burberry and Louis Vuitton, set in a dialogue with contemporary art. And it examines different and opposing attitudes to fashion – those of participants and spectators, individualists and conformists. Fashion becomes a communicative game that can lead us to a new understanding of the way we deal with fashion.

An exhibition by the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, and the Kyoto Costume Institute in cooperation with the Bundeskunsthalle in Bonn

Beuys – Lehmbruck
Thinking is Sculpture

25 June to 1 November 2021

There are not many artists who caused as radical an upheaval in the history of art as Joseph Beuys. With his concept of Social Sculpture, he sought to apply the liberating potential of art to all areas of life. At the very heart of his thinking was the dissolution of the boundaries between art and society, politics, science and education. Thus Beuys gave rise to a new, expanded concept of art.
In 1986, just a few days before his death, Beuys was awarded the Wilhelm Lehmbruck Prize. In his acceptance speech, he stressed the importance the art of the Expressionist sculptor had for him. He explained how his encounter with Lehmbruck’s work had led him to art in the first place and traced a connection between Lehmbruck and the development of his own concept of Social Sculpture. Marking the 100 th  birthday of Joseph Beuys, the exhibition Beuys – Lehmbruck. Thinking is Sculpture explores that idea and presents the work of the two artists.

An exhibition of the Bundeskunsthalle in cooperation with the Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg. The exhibition is part of the Beuys anniversary year programme »beuys 2021. 100 years joseph beuys«, a project of the Ministry of Culture and Science of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia in collaboration with the Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf. The patron is Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia Armin Laschet.

The Rainer Werner Fassbinder Method
A Retrospective

10 September 2021 to 6 March 2022

Rainer Werner Fassbinder (1945-1982) was the most important representative of the New German Cinema. The exhibition presents a comprehensive portrait of the great German filmmaker in the context of his time. He shaped and inspired post-war intellectual Germany. His creative non-conformity and artistic radicalism led him to make such legendary films and series as Fear Eats the Soul, The Marriage of Maria Braun, Eight Hours Don’t Make a Day and Berlin Alexanderplatz. The speed of his way of working enabled Fassbinder to be extremely prolific: in a career that lasted less than two decades, he wrote, shot or directed more than 40 feature films and 25 plays. Synthesising rigorous subjectivity and social analysis, several of his films deal with German history and current events. His work – the subject of fierce debate during his lifetime – has lost none of its vitality and significance. The exhibition links Fassbinder’s oeuvre and biography with the reality of everyday life in Germany at the time.

An exhibition of the Bundeskunsthalle in cooperation with the DFF - Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum, Frankfurt / Main, and the Rainer Werner Fassbinder Foundation, Berlin

Hoffmann Collection

29 October 2021 to 30 January 2022

With a selection of some 200 outstanding works – ranging from painting, photography, drawing and sculpture to installation, film and video art – the Bundeskunsthalle presents a comprehensive survey of modern art drawn from the important private collection put together by Erika and Rolf Hoffmann. The Hoffmanns made their first acquisitions in the 1960s, purchasing primarily directly from artists, with whom they maintained a close dialogue from the very beginning.
The exhibition presents an overview of the collection in all its individuality, subjectivity as well as intense privateness – Erika Hoffmann has been known to describe the works as ‘family members.’ Spanning many different media, the presentation gives rise to surprising correspondences that stimulate the visitors intellectually and emotionally. Works by artists such as Christian Boltanski, Isa Genzken, Georg Herold, Heinz Mack, Ernesto Neto, Marcel Odenbach, Pipilotti Rist, Matthew Ritchie, Frank Stella, Wolfgang Tillmans, Andy Warhol and Franz West explore existential and philosophical questions that have a timeless validity in our society.

An exhibition of the Bundeskunsthalle in cooperation with the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

The Brain

from 28 January 2022

The brain is one of the last big mysteries of the human body. What do we actually have in our heads, and how should we picture the processes that take place there? Are our mind and our body two separate entities, and how do we understand and construct the world around us? What will the human brain of the future look like? Will we become computer-assisted cyborgs? The cooperation of various disciplines is needed to address these complex questions. Although brain research is constantly delivering new results, many questions remain unanswered. The arts can help us to ponder concepts of thinking and feeling, consciousness and perception, memory and dream. The exhibition brings together scientific research and associatively linked works and objects of art and cultural history with a view to explore and gain a better understanding of the terra incognita of the human brain.