How this renovated villa has become a major hub of contemporary art and design
The Lenbachhaus museum is a popular stop for art crawls in Munich, and offers a range of photographs, paintings, metal sculptures, and other art works spanning three centuries. It shows how powerful the drive for creativity is during times of peace as well as war.
PhotoSparks is a weekly feature from YourStory, with photographs that celebrate the spirit of creativity and innovation. In the earlier 325 posts, we featured an art festival, cartoon gallery. world music festival, telecom expo, millets fair, climate change expo, wildlife conference, startup festival, Diwali rangoli, and jazz festival.
The Lenbachhaus museum in Munich is a prominent attraction in the city's Kunstareal (art district) at Konigsplatz, near the Pinakothek museums. The Lenbachhaus was founded in 1929 after a donation by the widow of the German artist Franz von Lenbach, and hosts popular exhibitions of contemporary art.
A museum extension was designed by the architectural firm Foster + Partners and inaugurated in 2013. The collections span photographs from the 18th century onwards, German expressionism (including the Blue Rider movement), post-war artists, and interactive digital art.
Some of the rooms have kept their original design from almost 130 years ago. Featured artists include Jan Polack, Christoph Schwarz, Georges Desmarees, Carl Rottmann, Eduard Schleich, James Coleman, Thomas Demand, Georgia O’Keefe, and Wilhelm Trubner.
Franz von Lenbach (1836-1904) was a celebrated portraitist during his time, with many members of the business and political class as his subjects. He also travelled extensively, to Austria, Spain, Italy, Egypt and Morocco. He contributed to the rise of Munich as an arts centre, and his studio is still on view at the museum.
The exhibitions capture the growth of photography as a creative medium (Georg Maria Eckert), innovative techniques of photographers in the black-and-white ‘analogue’ era (Adolphe Braun, Gustave le Gray), and early forms of landscape painting (Christian Morgenstern, Philipp Otto Runge, Wilhelm von Kobell).
The styles in the exhibition are drawn from Dresden to Berlin, and from Austria to the US. In this photo essay, we feature some of the pictures, paintings, metal sculptures, outdoor installations and ornamental clocks on display.
Now, what have you done today to spot the broader trends in the world around you, and anticipate how you may come up with a creative response?
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