With one of the internationally most important collections of German art – based on the seminal inventory of works by August Macke –, the Kunstmuseum disposes over a collection profile that is unparalleled throughout the country. The collection focuses on the Rhenish Expressionists, German Art after 1945 including Joseph Beuys’ Multiples as well as graphic art including photography and the video center Ingrid Oppenheim. The museum’s relevance has been steadily growing over the past decades. In this development, one of the special features of Bonn’s collecting policies has been to refrain from attempts to document German art with a claim to encyclopedic scope, but rather concentrate on a manageable number of eminent artists, and then purchase from them entire groups of works and ensembles.
One emphasis our Museum has established in this undertaking is to explore the potentials for development in painting. Our current activities are largely geared towards expanding previous research on the immanent and self-referential features of the picture with a focus on the social context and the social-political reality. As far as the museum’s exhibitions and collections are concerned, additional special emphasis has been put on presentations and purchases in the field of photography and media art. Furthermore, we pay special attention to crossovers in media art and to the interfaces between the individual media.
