Museum Berggruen to be extended
Press release from 12/18/2007
The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation will expand the Museum Berggruen in Berlin-Charlottenburg in accordance with today's decision by the Foundation Council. The family of Heinz Berggruen, who died in February 2007, intends to expand the holdings of the Museum Berggruen with high-calibre long-term loans. To this end, they are making further loans available. This includes works owned by individual family members - a total of 91 works by Picasso, Matisse, Cézanne, Klee, Chagall and Miro. These include around 50 works from the private collection of Heinz and Bettina Berggruen, which are already on loan to the museum but cannot be permanently displayed, mainly for reasons of space. The Berggruen Museum, the western Stüler building opposite Charlottenburg Palace, is now to be extended by a neighbouring building (Spandauer Damm 17). This is the only way to present the expanded collection of works on loan in a way that is appropriate to their significance.
The building at Spandauer Damm 17 is currently still owned by the state of Berlin. It is to be transferred to the foundation, refurbished for museum use with federal funds and connected to the existing Museum Berggruen by means of a transition. The corresponding planning tasks will be put out to tender and the project is due to start soon. During the remodelling, the preservation of historical monuments will be taken into account. The museum will remain open during the construction period.
In future, the museum will also be accessed from the Stüler Building. This will be reserved primarily for Picasso, while the building at Spandauer Damm 17 will have considerably more space to showcase the work of Paul Klee. It will be complemented by works by Matisse and Giacometti. The spatial expansion will also enable a more spacious entrance situation in the Stüler Building and create urgently needed space for the appropriate care of the collection.
Since 1996, the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin have been exhibiting the important art collection of Prof. Heinz Berggruen under the title "Picasso and His Time - The Berggruen Collection". It consists mainly of works by Pablo Picasso, supplemented by outstanding works by other important artists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries such as Henri Matisse, Paul Klee and Paul Cézanne. In addition to the collection acquired by the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation in 2000, the museum also has works on loan from the private collections of Heinz Berggruen and his wife Bettina. The museum is one of the main attractions of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. By the end of the year, around 120,000 visitors are expected to be counted in 2007.