12 Jan 2015

The Middelheim Museum to partner 'Blickachsen 10'

A collaboration opening new perspectives on three-dimensional art

Perspective change has from the beginning been a central motif of the 'Blickachsen' open-air Sculpture Biennale. With each new edition, the founder and curator of the 'Blickachsen' series, Christian K. Scheffel, has sought to encourage new ways of approach to contemporary sculpture, new impulses and an ever-changing artistic focus, by inviting a partner museum and guest curator to create the Biennale together with him.

From its second edition, 'Blickachsen' has collaborated with a variety of international institutions dedicated to showcasing modern sculpture. Renowned museums such as the Wilhelm Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg, Germany (2001), the Fondation Beyeler in Switzerland (2005), the Yorkshire Sculpture Park in the UK (2007), the Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park in the USA (2009), the Museum Beelden aan Zee in the Netherlands (2011) or the Fondation Maeght in France (2013) have through the years enriched the exhibitions in Bad Homburg with their own special vision of three-dimensional art.

Now, continuing this highly successful formula, Christian K. Scheffel is pleased to announce that the Middelheim Museum in Antwerp and its director Sara Weyns, are to be his partners for this, the tenth edition in the 'Blickachsen' series. Together with Sara Weyns and her co-curator Lieven Segers, he is developing this year's artistic concept for the historic park landscapes of Bad Homburg and other exhibition locations in the Rhine-Main region. 'The Middelheim Museum is honoured to have been invited to co-curate the tenth edition of Blickachsen,' comments Weyns. 'As one of the oldest open-air museums for modern and contemporary art worldwide, the Middelheim Museum shares fundamental principles with the regular Blickachsen exhibitions.'

Like 'Blickachsen', the Middelheim Museum also focuses on a symbiosis of high quality artworks in extensive park landscapes. As one of the pioneers of exhibitions in the open air, the museum looks back on a 60 year-old tradition. Following the world's first open-air exhibition of modern sculpture – in Battersea Park, London, in 1948 – and the 'Sonsbeck '49' show a year later in Arnhem, visitors were enthralled by the great sculpture exhibition held in Middelheim in 1950. The success of this exhibition led the city of Antwerp to found a permanent open-air museum, in which nature and art would be able to come together in a mutual artistic interplay. More than 200 works spanning a hundred years of sculptural history are brought together in the picturesque 27 hectare park landscape, attracting over 300,000 visitors every year. As a complement to the permanent exhibition of works by artists such as Auguste Rodin, Henry Moore, Dan Graham, Ai Weiwei and Roman Signer, the museum each year invites leading artists to create new works specifically for the park.


„Blickachsen 10“
International Sculpture Biennale in Bad Homburg and Frankfurt Rhine-Main, Germany
31 May - 4 October 2015
In collaboration with the Middelheim Museum, Antwerp, Belgium

Organisers:
Stiftung Blickachsen gGmbH (Blickachsen Foundation)
Municipality of the City of Bad Homburg
Kur- und Kongreß-GmbH, Bad Homburg
Administration of the Public Stately Homes & Gardens in Hesse

Information:
Detailed information on the “Blickachsen” series is available on www.blickachsen.com

Press:
For press requests, please send us an email via presse@blickachsen.de or call us on +49 – (0)178 – 47 32 591. High-resolution images can be downloaded from our website: www.blickachsen.com

About the Blickachsen Foundation:
The public benefit Blickachsen Foundation was established in March 2013 to provide an institutional home for the “Blickachsen” Sculpture Biennale. With its aim of securing the future of the Biennale as a showcase for contemporary international sculpture and art installations, the Foundation, with its seat in Bad Homburg, Germany, works together with the municipality of the city of Bad Homburg, the Kur- und Kongreß-GmbH and the Administration of Public Stately Homes and Gardens in Hesse to organise the biennial “Blickachsen” exhibitions in the public open spaces of Bad Homburg and the wider Rhine-Main region. The Foundation aims to offer both young and established artists from around the world a platform for their work in the open and public space, not only to promote new generations of artists but also to heighten popular interest in, and appreciation of, the most varied currents in three-dimensional art.