Status of Sculpture

At the beginning of March, Ms Silvia Menzel, a former gallery owner and now a freelance exhibition organiser, approached the foundation on the recommendation of Dr Wulf Herzogenrath (Nationalgalerie). She proposed organising a non-commercial exhibition project together with the foundation.

The exhibition “Status of Sculpture” was originally conceived by the art historian Bernard Brunon for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lyon and then travelled to a second venue in the Belgian city of Hasselt. The exhibition, in which ten American artists took part, showed the state of contemporary sculpture, which has largely been influenced by Marcel Duchamp.

Quite apart from the high quality of the exhibition, the international prestige it would bring the foundation and its value to the city of Berlin, the foundation’s Board of Trustees decided to realise the project because Mr Joachimides, director of the exhibition “Metropolis”, could also be won over to collaborate. This gave the foundation the opportunity to use 3,500 international addresses; a reply card was enclosed with the invitations, and about 850 of the people written to sent it back. As a result, valuable new contacts with people in the arts and culture in all parts of the world could subsequently be established.

Air France sponsored the transport of the exhibition; further backers were found in the private sector, so that the foundation incurred only minor costs.

The opening of “Status of Sculpture” took place almost in parallel with that of “Metropolis”, so that on 18 April 1991 it was possible to invite all the artists, lenders, international curators, museum directors and cultural managers connected with the exhibition “Metropolis”. Achieving such a level of recognition is so important to the foundation because it is the way applications from talented artists reach our house. High-quality work is also a precondition for continuing to receive support from the Berlin Senate, the federal government, companies and private individuals. “Metropolis” then opened on 19 April 1991, and those involved in “Status of Sculpture” were invited to that as well. The opening at the Löwenpalais followed on 20 April 1991 and, thanks to the publicity at the Martin-Gropius-Bau, drew a steady stream of visitors.

A further 87 figures from culture, politics and business then accepted the invitation to the benefit evening held on the occasion of the closing event. At this event the then Berlin Senator for Cultural Affairs, Roloff-Momin, paid tribute to the foundation’s patronage of the arts.