Kunsthalle Basel

The Kunsthalle Basel, located next to the Municipal Theater Basel and opposite the Concert Hall City Casino, is part of the cultural center of Basel. It is a place of exhibitions, which combine local and international, avant-garde and contemporary trends and offers space for both the issuance of new artistic work and methods as well as a social program that includes both artist talks and performances, as well as film and music events. Since 2003, the Kunsthalle Basel is under the direction of Adam Szymczyk.

History

The establishment of the Kunsthalle Basel was initiated by the merger of the company founded in 1839 Basler Kunstverein and the Basel Art Association in 1864. At the dedication of the building in the spring of 1872, the President of the Basler Kunstverein, Johann Jakob the function of art hall programmatically summed up in the yard, thus: " The visual arts to prepare a place to encourage in our own country 's interest for promoting, to maintain spread, and friendly relations among artists and art lovers. "

In the 1920s and 1930s, before the opening of the Kunstmuseum Basel, a public art collection of the city of Basel was kept and exhibited at the Kunsthalle Basel. Because of the continuing critical financial situation, the building was temporarily rented in the 1950s to government agencies before it came back into the possession of the Basler Kunstverein after renovation in 1969.

Architecture

Funded by the proceeds of two ferry services across the Rhine, the Kunsthalle Basel was built in 1869-1872 by the architect Johann Jakob Stehlin Burckhardt. Artists such as Arnold Böcklin, Carl Brno, Ernst Stückelberg Charles Iguel were involved in the artistic decoration of the building. Since its construction is located on the ground floor club house, which is now run as a " Restaurant Kunsthalle " independently.

Until 1927 the building was repeatedly architecturally enhanced to ( today, " city cinema Basel" ) set up in addition a sculptor's workshop as well as a sculpture hall. Between 1969 and 1973, the Kunsthalle Basel was first extensively renovated. The library whose holdings date back to the founding year of the Kunstverein and now their focus has in the field of contemporary art publications, was launched in 1992 in the former caretaker - quarters.

2004, further extensive renovations were carried out by the architects Miller & Maranta. The default for this was to preserve the ancient splendor of the building and bring it up to date at the same time, to meet the demands of contemporary exhibitions justice. The original meaning and function of the building - that is, the interplay of architecture and art - should remain intact as possible. In connection with the renovation also the Swiss Architecture Museum S AM has been integrated on the first floor of the building.