At First Sight

Curated by Nico Anklam. 

With works by: Josef Albers, Marina Apollonio, Erich Bödeker, Vivian Ellis, Ayşe Erkmen, Gotthard Graubner, Günther Haese, Alain Jacquet, Jiří Kolář, Jeewi Lee, Max Leiß, Heinz Mack, Susanne Paesler, Otto Piene, Michael Sailstorfer, Morgaine Schäfer, Berit Schneidereit, Nicolas Schöffer, Emil Schumacher, Heinrich Siepmann, Günter Tollmann, Günther Uecker, Timm Ulrichs, Wolf Vostell, Andy Warhol, Hans Werdehausen, Fritz Winter, Tobias Zielony and works from the collections of the former Vestisches Museum and the coptic wing of the Icon Museum Recklinghausen

The Kunsthalle Recklinghausen is a municipal museum with a collection of over 5,000 works that has continuously grown since it was founded in 1950. Historically linked with the former Vestisches Museum, the Kunsthalle today focuses on works of the artist group “junger westen,” founded in Recklinghausen in 1947, and continuously purchased works by the winners of the same prize, as well as kinetic art, Art Informel, and it sports an important collection of non academically trained artists that had links to the the cole miners’ milieu of the region.

For the first time, the new presentation establishes formal relationships between these different focal points of the collection. Besides challenging previous categorizations, At First Sight: New Perspectives on the Collection of the Kunshtalle Recklinghausen brings several works from storage on view that have never been displayed before, or have not been visible for decades.

Within the spectacular ensemble of the ZERO Group on the upper floor, Günther Uecker’s Homage à Broadway (1965) was restored this year with funds from the Ernst von Siemens Art Foundation and can now be seen after a long storage period for the first time again. The same applies to Heinz Mack’s Licht Dynamo (1964), the restoration of which was funded by the Ministry of Culture and Science of North Rhine-Westphalia. Providing further spotlight-like insights into the various clusters of the collectiom the show intends to make the works more visible and tangible, but also aims to provide unorthodox cross-references. In this way, the weaknesses of the collection also become apparent: there is a lack of non-male positions, to name but one. The Kunsthalle Recklinghausen already started to diversify its collection since Nico Anklam became its director last year. This process will continue in the future.

The perception of the Kunsthalle as a collecting museum lags behind its busy exhibition schedule as an art hall with temporary shows so far. This should now change with At First Sight. After all, this presentation is really only the “first” insight into the rich collection of the Recklinghausen Municipal Museums, on which the focus of attention will be again for the 75th anniversary of the Kunsthalle in 2025.

With generous support by Ernst von Siemens Kunststiftung and Ministerium für Kultur und Wissenschaft des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen

The Museums of the City of Recklinghausen 
Museum Director and Head of the Kunsthalle: Dr. des. Nico Anklam 
Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeit/Curator: Kerstin Weber, M.A.  

For all press inquiries, please contact Kerstin Weber at weber@kunst-re.de.