Weserburg Museum für moderne Kunst presents its exhibition program from March 2023 to March 2024.
From De Stijl to Boekie Woekie: Artist Publications from The Netherlands
March 11–September 10, 2023
Centre for Artists’ Publications
The exhibition spans more than a century of art from the Netherlands. It begins with the De Stijl movement of the early twentieth century, as well as Theo van Doesburg’s same-named journal, which was dedicated to the revival of not just art, but also architecture, design, typography, and poetry. The final spotlight is on Boekie Woekie, Amsterdam’s artist-run bookstore for books by artists, which is already legendary. The exhibition is a collaboration with the Dutch Brokken Zijp Foundation of Art (BFA).
Artists
Karel Appel, Stanley Brouwn, Aart van Barneveld, Ulises Carrion, Hans Clavin, Constant, Corneille, Herman Damen, Ad Dekkers, Theo van Doesburg, Christian Dotremont, Pier van Dyck, Henriëtte van Egten, Michael Gibbs, Nan Groot Antink, Harry Haarsma, Harmen de Hoop, Ko de Jonge, Asger Jorn, Bert Loerakker, Lucebert, Jan van Munster, Willem de Ridder, Tajiri Shinkichi, Peter Struycken, Rod Summers, Oej Tjeng Sit, Fiona Tan, Jan van der Til, Rúna Torkelsdóttir, Friedrich Vordemberge-Gildewart, Jan Voss, herman de vries, Marijke van Warmerdam, Alicja Werbachowska, Robert Zandvliet.
Hannah Villiger: I Am The Sculpture
July 1–October 8, 2023
Hannah Villiger (1951-1997) was a trained sculptor in Switzerland. She employed a Polaroid camera to conduct a cartographical examination of her own body and its immediate spatial surrounds, examining both in large-scale pictorial forms and lengthy blocks for their sculptural aspects. On the one hand, her artistic production is an examination of her own existence through corporeality, nature, or urban architecture, and on the other, an experimental mixing of classical attributions of genre. On the basis of these topics, her work creates clarity, bravery, and poetry that are more relevant today than ever.
The Swiss artist Eric Hattan (b. 1956, living in Basel) was commissioned to choose, arrange, and position the paintings on show. He is a coeditor of Villiger’s catalogue raisonné and a nationally acknowledged specialist on her creative output as both an artistic partner and the longterm administrator of her estate. He has developed an exhibition for the Weserburg that lays out the major subject lines of her oeuvre through outstanding works and makes a connection between personal and objective access. In this endeavor, “Hannah Villiger. I Am The Sculpture” combines unexpected work constellations with estate materials and Eric Hattan’s filmic viewpoint onto Villiger’s sculptural and photographic ideas.
In collaboration with foundation THE ESTATE OF HANNAH VILLIGER.
The Way We Are 5.0
September 30, 2023–January 26, 2025
What began in 2019 as an experimental trial of a new exhibition concept has since effectively established itself. The collection exhibition “The Way We Are” will get its fifth fresh hanging.
Instead of focusing on a single collection, the serially arranged show draws together loans from a wide number of international private and corporate collections, as well as from artists, supplemented by examples from the museum’s own stock of works. The works from diverse eras and situations are arranged into subject categories to allow visitors’ access to the multitude of works outside of standard art-historical attributions. Once a year, the present constellations of works from various settings and eras are adjusted: works are added, removed, or wander into another context; theme sections are altered; and new artist’s spaces are installed. This opens up the possibility of creating new discoveries as well as re-discovering masterpieces. “The Way We Are” spans over 2,500 square meters and provides insights into international art from the 1960s to the present, inspiring surprising interpretations through a variety of media. Topics of current social debate are addressed, and form questions are posed – richly variegated, startling, dynamic, and consistently different.
KONTAKT with Guy Schraenen
October 14, 2023–February 4, 2024
Centre for Artists’ Publications
Guy Schraenen, an internationally active collector, gallery owner, publisher, essayist, filmmaker, and radio program producer, had a formative influence on the formation of today’s Centre for Artists’ Publications at the Weserburg Museum für moderne Kunst as a freelance curator. The Archive for Small Press and Communication (ASPC), which he founded in Antwerpen in 1974, served as the groundwork for the establishment of this department at the Weserburg in 1999, which is now Europe’s only one of its kind. Over more than ten years, Schraenen staged roughly thirty shows at the Weserburg, including the comprehensive survey “Out of Print. An Archive as an Artistic Concept” in 2001, and “Vinyl. Records & Artist Covers” in 2005. In November 2018, he died in Paris.
The Centre for Artists’ Publications is offering an overview of Guy Schraenen’s numerous endeavors in homage and remembrance of his artistic work. The show is being staged in partnership with the Biblioteca y Centro de Documentación at Madrid’s Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reine Sofa.
Kay Rosen: NOW AND THEN
November 18, 2023–March 31, 2024
Kay Rosen’s first institutional solo exhibition in Europe is on display at the Weserburg Museum für moderne Kunst. The American artist (b. 1943 in Corpus Christi, Texas; lives in New York City and Gary, Indiana) has been employing language as creative material since the 1970s. She is well recognized internationally for her large-scale wall works that depict individual words, sentences, or series of letters. Coming together here in an outstanding manner are minimalist form, aesthetic impact and informative contents.
Kay Rosen adds puzzling twists to everyday concepts and words through their arrangement as well as font and color design. Kay Rosen consistently uncovers startling layers of language importance, whether through neologisms, redefinitions, or onomatopoetic investigations. Issues requiring a social critique are frequently brought to light.
The Bremen exhibition includes wall works, paintings, sketches, prints, and videos. In addition to representative large works, there are new, wall-filling paintings created specifically for the museum’s rooms. In honor of the artist’s eightieth birthday, the Weserburg is facilitating a new engagement with and rediscovery of a multifaceted artistic output.
Weserburg Museum für moderne Kunst
Teerhof 20
28199 Bremen
Germany
[email protected]
