English

THE ADVENTURE OF ABSTRACTION
FROM 23.4.23

Rekonstruktion Merzbau, Foto: Herling/Herling/Werner, Sprengel Museum Hannover

In “The Adventure of Abstraction”, the Sprengel Museum Hannover is showing a significant part of its collection in the museum’s newly fitted rooms. The selection provides an overview of major manifestations of and developments in non-representational art from the beginning of the 20th century to the present day. The starting point and focus of the tour are the reconstructions of El Lissitzky’s “Cabinet of the Abstract” (1927) and Kurt Schwitters’ “Merz Construction” (1933). Both rooms, which previously existed in Hannover, embody influential stages in abstract art and allow the visitor to directly experience the interplay of colour and form.

In addition to outstanding works by Schwitters and Lissitzky, Classical Modernism is represented by works by Piet Mondrian, Hans Arp and Paul Klee, among others. From the post-war period are works by, among others, Willi Baumeister, Pierre Soulages and K.O. Götz. These lead on to contemporary artists, such as Pia Fries, Pippilotti Rist and Wolfgang Tillmans. Awaiting discovery in the 18 rooms of “The Adventure of Abstraction” are a cabinet of graphic works, expansive media artworks and abstract films from the early days of the medium.

ARTISTS IN HANNOVER UNDER NATIONAL SOCIALISM

On the museum’s mezzanine floor, another area opens up that takes a look at Hannover artists and art from 1933 to 1945. Taking nine people as examples and tracing historical events, the exhibition illuminates the situation of art and artists under National Socialism and asks how the political conditions impacted on the institutions and artists’ lives and work, museum staff and collectors. Finally, we investigate the extent to which the Nazi past continues to affect the museum to this day.

Curator of “The Adventure of Abstraction”: Isabel Schulz

Curatorial assistant for “The Adventure of Abstraction”: Julius Osman

Official opening: 23.4.23, NN

Press conference: 19.4.23, 11.00 am

WHICH MODERNISM? INSIDERS AND OUTSIDERS OF THE AVANT-GARDE
6.5. TO 17.9.23

Otto Dix, Die Eltern des Künstlers II, 1924, Öl auf Leinwand, 118 x 130,5 cm, Sprengel Museum Hannover, Kunstbesitz der Landeshauptstadt Hannover; © VG Bild-Kunst 2023; Foto: Herling / Herling / Werner, Sprengel Museum Hannover

With “Les maitres populaires de la réalité”, WHICH MODERNISM? is devoted to a historical exhibition. In 1937, during the World’s Fair in Paris, the show featured works by, among others, Henri Rousseau, Séraphine Louis, André Bauchant and Camille Bombois. The artists never saw themselves as a coherent group, but they were regarded as a popular counter-movement to other styles, such as Classical Modernism, with whose exponents they were in close contact. Once the attention had died down after the World’s Fair, most of the artists and their work were considered “naïve”, “modern primitives” or “outsider artists”.

With around 100 works from the private collections of the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz (Gunzenhauser Collection), the Sprengel Museum Hannover (Sprengel Collection), the Zander Collection and (inter)national loans, the exhibition WHICH MODERNISM? presents links and relationships between well-known figures of Classical Modernism. The focus is not only on comparing pictures, but also on similarities with and differences from other important movements such as Surrealism. Examples of aesthetics in photography and cinema, as well as contemporary documents, complete the sweeping tour of Modernism. The selection of works permits a new reading of developments in modern art.

At the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz from 22.10.23 to 14.1.24

Curators: Reinhard Spieler, Manja Wilkens

Press conference: 4.5.23, 11.00 am

Official opening: 5.5.23, 7.00 pm

LABORATORY OF MODERNISM. ART FROM 1924 TO 1945 FROM THE GRAPHIC ART COLLECTION
17.5. TO 30.7.23

Conrad Felixmüller, Porträt Thea Sternheim, 1924 (Detail), Aquarell, Leihgabe Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum Hannover, Sprengel Museum Hannover; © VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2023; Foto: Herling/Herling/Werner, Sprengel Museum Hannover

With graphic works by Grethe Jürgens, René Magritte and Pablo Picasso, the exhibition presents artwork from 1924 to 1945 from the collection of the Sprengel Museum Hannover. From the beginning of the Roaring Twenties via the Great Depression to the National Socialists’ seizure of power in Germany – referred to in cultural history as the “laboratory of modernism” – various art movements coexisted: Naturalism, Cubism, Dadaism and Expressionism of the older generation were still current, along with Abstraction, Constructivism and Bauhaus. With the increasing urbanisation of the cities, New Objectivity – especially the form it took in Hannover – became increasingly popular from the mid-1920s onwards.

Curator: Karin Orchard

Press conference: 16.5.23, 11.00 am

Official opening: 16.5.23, 18.30 pm

OCULAR WITNESS: THE WHOLE HOG
23.8. TO 5.11.23

Marcus Weber, Stop Killing Bees, 100 x 70 cm, 2021, aus dem Projekt Heidi Specker, Cornfeld (Einladung an 27 Künstler*innen, einen Siebdruck nach einem historischen Kupferstich zu bearbeiten); © Marcus Weber, 2023

Humans and pigs – what kind of relationship do they have? More similar in genetic make-up than we think, pigs are intelligent, playful and – like us – omnivorous. But our relationship is anything but on an equal footing. There’s no doubting that we humans dictate how and where pigs live. But what are we doing to ourselves and our environment with an industry that produces meat with production-line methods? OCULAR WITNESS: THE WHOLE HOG takes the pig-human relationship as an opportunity to reflect on our relations with ourselves, with pigs and with the world. What does the global meat industry mean for lifestyles in rural regions? What is the real price of our pork chop, roast or sausage? And is it possible to use the means of art to address social and political issues that are as concrete as they are complex and to put them up for discussion?

The exhibition brings together artists who explore these issues. All of them – biologists, sociologists, bee educators, chefs, shop assistants, etc. – bring their specialist knowledge to the table.

Curator: Inka Schube

Press conference: 22.8.23, 11.00 am

Official opening: 22.8.23, 6.30 pm

ADRIAN SAUER. SPECTRUM INTERNATIONAL PRIZE FOR PHOTOGRAPHY OF THE STIFTUNG NIEDERSACHSEN
14.10.23 TO 14.1.24

Adrian Sauer, 16.777.216 Farben in unterschiedlichen Anordnungen – Grüner Smiley, Farbton, 100 cm x 100 cm, Digitaler C-Print, 2023

By selecting Adrian Sauer as the winner of the SPECTRUM International Prize for Photography, the jury is honouring the Leipzig-based artist who has been exploring developments in the medium of photography for around 20 years. Sauer places his focus on the consequences of and changes in photography due to digitisation: with the help of computer programs he has written himself, Sauer examines photographic functionality, uncovers problems and critically questions the extent to which the photograph can still be considered a reliable and unbiased image of reality.

The award ceremony will take place during the official opening of the exhibition on 13 October 2023 at the Sprengel Museum Hannover.

The SPECTRUM International Prize for Photography has been awarded to outstanding contemporary art photographers since 1994. Previous recipients include Zanele Muholi (2021), Fiona Tan (2019), Helen Levitt (2008), John Baldessari (1999) and Thomas Struth (1997).

Curator: Stefan Gronert

Press conference: 12.10.23, 11.00 am

Official opening: 13.10.23, 7.00 pm

CHRISTIAN RETSCHLAG. SPRENGEL PRIZE 2024. LOWER SAXONY IN EUROPE
18.11.23 TO 28.1.24

Christian Retschlag, Dinosaurier, Silbergelatine, 5 x 7 cm, 2021

In his photographic work, Christian Retschlag is concerned with his experience and what he learns from it. History and fiction, reality and deception – both seem possible, equally real in his works. As part of the travel scholarship, Retschlag is undertaking a cycling tour from Lower Saxony to Mont Ventoux in Provence so as to directly experience the landscape and history of his travel locations. On his tour, he is interested in sites associated with such events as the Franco-Prussian War, the invention of photography and the Tour de France.

Following his travels, the SPRENGEL PRIZE will be awarded in November 2023 and a solo exhibition will be held at the Sprengel Museum Hannover. A catalogue documenting the prize-winner’s work as well as his time spent abroad in Europe will be published at the opening of the exhibition.

The SPRENGEL PRIZE is worth EUR 12,500 and is tied to the “Lower Saxony in Europe” travel grant, which provides a further EUR 12,500 for a six-month stay abroad. The prize is sponsored by the Niedersächsische Sparkassenstiftung and the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture.

Curator: Carina Plath

Press conference: 16.11.23, 11.00 am

Official opening: 17.11.23, 7.00 pm

BRIEF HISTORY OF PHOTOGRAPHY, #3. AN EXHIBITION IN SEVERAL CHAPTERS
29.11.23 TO 25.2.24

Viktoria Binschtok, Proofs, Oldenburger Kunstverein, 2022

Although photography was patented back in 1839 and is therefore considered ‘invented’, the art form of this pictorial medium has only been displayed in international museums and exhibition venues since the 1990s. In retrospect, the now legendary essay “A Short History of Photography” (1931) by Walter Benjamin (1892 to 1940) seems to provide initial guidance within the diversity of approaches to photography. In his influential essay, Benjamin discusses important categories and positions of early modern photography. But how are we to understand the more recent history – or rather the histories – of photography post-Benjamin?

The exhibition series of the Sprengel Museum Hannover attempts to find an answer and presents key themes of developments in recent photographic history in the art context. After 2018 and 2020, this is the third exhibition to highlight central concepts of the history of photography. Classic themes of the medium such as archive and collage figure just as strongly as the less expected concepts of the monochrome and the written word.

With works by Boris Becker, Laura Bielau, Viktoria Binschtok, William Christenberry, Marie Clerel, Natalie Czech, Inge Dick, Philipp Goldbach, Beate Gütschow, Uschi Huber, Sven Johne, Astrid Klein, Lilly Lulay, Peter Miller, Andreas Müller-Pohle, Timm Rautert, Michael Reisch, Martha Rosler, Katja Stuke & Oliver Sieber, Wolfgang Tillmansand Ger van Elk

Curator: Stefan Gronert

Press conference: 28.11.23, 11.00 am

Official opening: 28.11.23, 6.30 pm

ELEMENTARY PARTS. BASIC PARTS OF THE SPRENGEL MUSEUM HANNOVER AND ITS ART
13.4.19 TO 25.2.24

The exhibition ELEMENTARY PARTS poses simple and obvious questions about art that nevertheless prove to be absolutely fundamental: What is art? What are works of art actually made of, which materials are used? Which formal languages do they employ? Which reality (or realities) do they refer to between the figurative, the abstract and the virtual? What is art about, what kind of narratives does it tell, and how does it reflect history? In nine themed rooms, the exhibition unfolds an impressive spectrum of the fundamental possibilities of the material, formal and expressive languages of art and its levels of meaning.

The main topics are colour, material, form/shape, realities, history/narratives, natural and human shaped spaces, strong emotions and finally faces, which ultimately reflect our image of human kind. The exhibition brings together a total of more than 150 works from painting, sculpture, drawing, graphic art and film/video (installation) – all part of the Sprengel Museum Hannover’s collection or on permanent loan. They cover a period stretching from the dawn of Modern Art at the beginning of the 20th century to the immediate present. The selection ranges from Max Beckmann, Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger and Paul Klee via Louise Bourgeois, Sean Scully, Timm Ulrichs, Niki de Saint Phalle and Gerhard Richter to Marlene Dumas, Andrea Fraser, Bruce Nauman, Julian Charrière, Julius von Bismarck, Christoph Girardet and Julia Schmid.

At the beginning of the exhibition, a further room is dedicated to the Sprengel Museum Hannover itself, thematising the basic elements that make up the institution: What is the legal basis for relations between the museum and its sponsors, donors, (permanent) lenders and partners? What collections does it consist of? What departments are there and what are they each responsible for?

With ELEMENTARY PARTS, the Sprengel Museum Hannover is celebrating both the 50th anniversary of the donation of Bernhard and Margrit Sprengel and the 40th year of the museum’s existence.