Friends of Art – 40 Years of Collecting

Sat, Apr 29, 2023–Sun, Oct 15, 2023

Kaiser Wilhelm Museum

In 1983, art enthusiasts in Krefeld came together to actively support the Kunstmuseen Krefeld in the form of a registered association. Since then, every single member has helped to acquire works of art from our exhibitions and projects that strengthen the municipal collection in an outstanding way. Over the past 40 years, the collection of the Freunde der Kunstmuseen Krefeld e.V. (Friends of the Kunstmuseen Krefeld) has grown to around 150 works of all kinds, including paintings, prints, sculptures, photography, and video. The enthusiasm for collecting got off to a flying start with six watercolors by Gerhard Richter from the late 1970s. Recent acquisitions by the artist community raumlaborberlin and the Czech artist Eva Kot’átková testify to the openness and sensitivity with which the association approaches contemporary developments in art. Spanning between the two is a concise selection of works by outstanding German and international artists that chronicle our exhibition history.
On display on the second floor of the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum is a generous selection of the Friends’ collection, resulting in new, sometimes surprising connections between the works.

Artists (selection): Mamma Andersson, Carl Andre, Hubert Kiecol, Harald Klingelhöller, Imi Knoebel, Eva Kot’átková, Fabian Marcaccio, Bruce Nauman, Sigmar Polke, Norbert Prangenberg, raumlaborberlin, Gerhard Richter, Martin Schwenk, Richard Serra, Luc Tuymans, Jan Vercruysse, Sharon Ya’ari and others