Board of Trustees welcomes realisation of all elements of the Museum Island Berlin master plan
Press release from 12/04/2006
At its meeting today, the Board of Trustees of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation noted with great satisfaction that all elements of the Masterplan it adopted in June 1999 can now be implemented following the recent decisions by the Federal Government and Parliament.
The decision taken on 9 November 2006 to bring forward the release of 73 million euros to finance the James Simon Gallery will enable the timely completion of the new entrance building, which will provide information, orientation and hospitality on the Museum Island and offer space for temporary exhibitions. The Foundation is currently in planning discussions with the commissioned architect David Chipperfield regarding both the internal organisation and the exterior of the building.
The decision to renovate and extend the Pergamonmuseum, including the addition of a fourth wing, the structural work for the Archaeological Promenade in the basement and the connection to the new entrance building, has now led to the design planning. With the release of the necessary funds totalling 351 million euros in February 2006, the last of the five historic buildings is now in the active restoration phase.
The Archaeological Promenade, with its connecting spaces within the respective building outlines, is already being realised during the restoration phase, so that at the end of the entire construction period on the Museum Island, only the short connecting sections between the historic buildings need to be completed.
Two buildings (Alte Nationalgalerie since 2001 and Bode-Museum since October 2006) have now been reopened after a thorough refurbishment phase. The Neues Museum will be restored by 2008 and reopened in 2009.
Klaus-Dieter Lehmann, President of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, explains: "At last we can see how the mosaic of individual measures is coming together to form an overall picture and how the Museum Island is becoming a truly urban place."