Museum Berggruen
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The Berggruen Museum (also known as the Berggruen Collection) is a collection of modern art classics in
Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...
, which the collector and dealer Heinz Berggruen, in a "gesture of reconciliation", gave to his native city. The most notable artists on display include
Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
, Alberto Giacometti, Georges Braque,
Paul Klee Paul Klee (; 18 December 1879 – 29 June 1940) was a Swiss-born German artist. His highly individual style was influenced by movements in art that included expressionism, cubism, and surrealism. Klee was a natural draftsman who experimented ...
and
Henri Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a drawing, draughtsman, printmaking, printmaker, and sculptur ...
. The Berggruen Collection is part of the
National Gallery of Berlin The National Gallery (german: Nationalgalerie) in Berlin, Germany, is a museum for art of the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. It is part of the Berlin State Museums. From the Alte Nationalgalerie, which was built for it and opened in 1876, its exh ...
.


History

The collection arrived in Berlin in 1996, with Berggruen's return to his native city after six decades in exile. In 1988 he had given about 90
Klee Paul Klee (; 18 December 1879 – 29 June 1940) was a Swiss-born German artist. His highly individual style was influenced by movements in art that included expressionism, cubism, and surrealism. Klee was a natural draftsman who experimented wi ...
s to the
Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...
, and in 1990, he had agreed to make a five-year loan (renewable by mutual agreement) to the
National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director ...
in London of 72 paintings and drawings by
Paul Cézanne Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th-century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically d ...
,
Georges Seurat Georges Pierre Seurat ( , , ; 2 December 1859 – 29 March 1891) was a French post-Impressionist artist. He devised the painting techniques known as chromoluminarism and pointillism and used conté crayon for drawings on paper with a rough su ...
,
Vincent van Gogh Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2,100 artworks, inc ...
,
Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
, Georges Braque, and Joan Miró.John Russell (June 3, 1990)
Gifts That Can Change The Climate Of A Museum
''The New York Times''.
Also in 1990, negotiations with
Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía The ''Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía'' ("Queen Sofía National Museum Art Centre"; MNCARS) is Spain's national museum of 20th-century art. The museum was officially inaugurated on September 10, 1992, and is named for Queen Sofía. It ...
for the Berggruen collection to be shown in Madrid fell through. Berggruen initially lent the collection, which he had assembled over 30 years, to the
Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation (german: Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz; SPK) is a German federal government body that oversees 27 museums and cultural organizations in and around Berlin, Germany. Its purview includes all of Berlin's ...
(PCHF). He finally sold it to the PCHF in December 2000, for the "symbolic" price of 253 million
marks Marks may refer to: Business * Mark's, a Canadian retail chain * Marks & Spencer, a British retail chain * Collective trade marks, trademarks owned by an organisation for the benefit of its members * Marks & Co, the inspiration for the novel ...
, well below its then estimated value of 1.5 billion marks.Ein Giacometti zum Abschied
'' Die Tageszeitung'', 16 December 2006.
Today it is exhibited under the title "Berggruen Collection – Picasso and His Time" as part of the National Gallery of Berlin, in the West Stüler Building on Schloßstraße, opposite
Charlottenburg Palace Schloss Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg Palace) is a Baroque palace in Berlin, located in Charlottenburg, a district of the Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf borough. The palace was built at the end of the 17th century and was greatly expanded during th ...
. The centrepiece of the collection is the work of Picasso, with over 100 exhibits, together with over 60 pictures by Paul Klee. Henri Matisse is represented by over 20 works, including more than half a dozen of his famous cutouts.
Sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable ...
ensembles by Alberto Giacometti and examples of African sculpture round out the core of the collection. Berggruen continued to purchase works after the museum's opening in 1996, including Picasso's important 1909 painting ''Houses on the Hill'' (''Horta de Ebro'') from the
Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
in New York. A total of 165 works were transferred from Berggruen to the PCHF in the 2000 sale. In 2005 the Berggruen family acquired Picasso's ''Nu Jaune'' (1907) for $13.7 million at
Sotheby's Sotheby's () is a British-founded American multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, an ...
in New York. This
gouache Gouache (; ), body color, or opaque watercolor is a water-medium paint consisting of natural pigment, water, a binding agent (usually gum arabic or dextrin), and sometimes additional inert material. Gouache is designed to be opaque. Gouache ...
is one of the first studies for ''
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon ''Les Demoiselles d'Avignon'' (''The Young Ladies of Avignon'', originally titled ''The Brothel of Avignon'') is a large oil painting created in 1907 by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. The work, part of the permanent collection of the Museum o ...
'', a milestone in 20th-century art. To mark the 10th anniversary of the museum, and his permanent retirement from public life at the age of 92, Berggruen donated a sculpture by Alberto Giacometti, ''Standing Woman III'', to the collection in December 2006. It had in fact already been on loan at the museum until then, standing in the Stüler Building's rotunda. To keep the two-metre high bronze statue within the collection – his life's work – Berggruen quickly purchased it and donated it to the PCHF. Several weeks later, on 23 February 2007, he died in
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...
. The museum received 1.5 million visitors during its first decade from 1996 to 2006. Besides the permanent exhibition "Picasso and His Time", the museum hosts numerous special exhibitions on themes of classic modern art.


Expansion

In July 2007 the heirs to Berggruen's estate announced that they would present a further 50 classic modern works to the museum, in order to continue in their father's tradition of reconciliation with Germany. Since the transfer at Christmas 2000 Berggruen had continued to purchase paintings, including works by Picasso, Matisse, Klee and Cézanne, among others. To make an expansion possible, the state of Berlin announced that it would endow the PCHF with a new building for its 50th anniversary: the Kommandantenhaus, adjacent to the West Stüler Building. A society for friends of the Berggruen Museum (''Förderkreis Museum Berggruen e. V.'') was founded at the same time, with members including Berggruen's widow Bettina, his children Nicolas, Olivier, John and Helen, as well as
Michael Blumenthal Werner Michael Blumenthal (born January 3, 1926) is a German-American business leader, economist and political adviser who served as United States Secretary of the Treasury under President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1979. At age thirteen, Blumenth ...
,
Michael Naumann Michael Naumann (born 8 December 1941) is a German politician, publisher and journalist. He was the German culture minister, secretary of culture from 1998 until 2001. He is married to Marie Warburg, daughter of Eric Warburg and granddaughter of ...
and Simon de Pury. The PCHF agreed to take on the running costs of the society. Plans were announced in 2008 to connect the two buildings with a glass pergola, chosen from an architectural competition, to be paid for by the government and installed by the state of Berlin.Museum Berggruen: Ein großes Erbe
Bernhard Schulz, ''
Der Tagesspiegel ''Der Tagesspiegel'' (meaning ''The Daily Mirror'') is a German daily newspaper. It has regional correspondent offices in Washington D.C. and Potsdam. It is the only major newspaper in the capital to have increased its circulation, now 148,000, ...
'', 31 May 2008.
In May 2008 a further 70 paintings were added to the collection. In 2011, the seminal Picasso painting '' Les Femmes d'Alger'' ("Version L," 1955) was acquired for the museum at auction for $21.4 million.


Collection highlights

File:Benin, Memorial head, 18th cent., Museum Berggruen, Berlin (1) (40205139571).jpg, 18th-century Memorial head, Benin File:Portrait de Madame Cézanne, par Paul Cézanne, 1885, coll. privée, FWN 475.jpg,
Paul Cézanne Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th-century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically d ...
, ''Portrait de Madame Cézanne'' (1885) File:Pablo Picasso, 1909, Maisons à Horta (Houses on the Hill, Horta de Ebro), oil on canvas, 65 x 81 cm, private collection.jpg,
Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
, ''Houses on the Hill, Horta de Ebro'' (1909) File:Pablo Picasso, 1914, Ma Jolie (Pipe, verre, as de trèfle, bouteille de Bass, guitare, dé), oil on canvas, 45 x 41 cm, private collection.jpg, Picasso, ''Ma Jolie'' (1914) File:Pablo Picasso, 1921, Nu assis s'essuyant le pied (Seated Nude Drying her Foot), pastel, 66 x 50.8 cm, Berggruen Museum.jpg, Picasso, ''Seated Nude Drying her Foot'' (1921)


References


External links


Home page on the Berlin State Museums website
{{authority control Art museums and galleries in Berlin Buildings and structures in Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf Art museums established in 1996 1996 establishments in Germany Berlin State Museums Berggruen family