Opening 19/11/2009
Curators: international museum directors
Exhibition organisation: Anna Szöke, Andreas Hoffer

On the occasion of its 10th anniversary in 2009, the Essl Museum has invited ten international museums to take part in the exhibition project >ASPECTS OF COLLECTING<. All participating institutions and museums received a certain budget and were asked to acquire works of art they considered interesting and significant. The selection was made by the respective museum directors or curators. There were no conditions imposed, there was only the recommendation to focus on contemporary art.

The Essl Museum will also contribute its own acquisition scheme. The selected sets of works will be presented in an exhibition at the Essl Museum and will then be made available to the individual museums as permanent loans.

TAL R Adieu Interessant (brown), 2005-2008 Mischtechnik auf Leinwand 250 x 253 cm Foto: Jochen Littkemann, courtesy CFA, Berlin © Sammlung Essl Privatstiftung	SARAH MORRIS 1972 [Rings], 2006 Household gloss paint on canvas 289 x 578 cm Courtesy White Cube © Sarah Morris

The project partners were primarily selected on the basis of personal contacts established by the art collector Karlheinz Essl, who considered it important to invite not only institutions in Western Europe, but wanted to involve renowned museums with very different cultural and socio-political backgrounds. The wish to enhance future networking and co-operation and foster intercultural exchanges is one of the main driving forces of the project.

PARTNER MUSEUMS: 1. ARKEN Museum for Moderne Kunst - Ishøj/Denmark 2. India Habitat Centre - New Delhi/India 3. LOUISIANA Museum of Modern Art - Humlebæk/Denmark 4. MART Museo di arte moderna e contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto - Italy 5. MdM Museum der Moderne - Salzburg/Austria 6. MOT Museum of Contemporary Art - Tokio/Japan 7. ms Muzeum Sztuki w Łodzi - Poland 8. Muzej suvremene umjetnosti - Zagreb/Croatia 9. Städel Museum - Frankfurt a. M./Germany 10. TATE Liverpool - Liverpool/UK

This exhibition project will incorporate a range of different collection concepts. As the ten institutions received the same level of funding, a number of questions arose. Where will the individual museums place their focus? How important is the profile of a collection for its acquisition decisions? Will the decision-makers opt for a range of artists or will they use the entire budget on one single artistic stance?

The resulting acquisition concepts of the eleven institutions – ten participants and the Essl Museum - are marked by great diversity. The range covers anything from a focus on one individual work of art (Tate, MOT) to works that complement the collection focus (MdM, Louisiana), a curatorial exploration of painting at the margins of European art after 1945 (Städel), a themebased concept (MART, MSL) or broad-based acquisitions of young art (MSU, IHC). One thing has become particularly clear: there is a wealth of options for enlarging and enhancing collections, which is an important element that must be fostered and strengthened.

JESPER JUST A Voyage in Dwelling, 2008 Trilogie, Installation auf 3 Wänden, Super 16mm transferiert auf HD-File 25'58'' © Jesper Just	PIPILOTTI RIST Videostill: A Liberty Statue for Tökyö, 2008-2009 Audiovideoinstallation (Monolithversion mit 3 DVD Playern, 3 Projektoren, Tonanlage, Spiegel und Lounge Element und Kissen) 475 x 770 x 650 cm © Pipilotti Rist

>ASPECTS OF COLLECTING< offers the unique opportunity to compare divergent collecting and purchasing strategies in one exhibition and will encourage the visitors to discover a great wealth of artistic production.

PARTICIPATING ARTISTS

Lovro Artukovic, Micol Assaël, Miriam Bäckström, Stephan Balkenhol, Martin Barré, Milivoj Bijelic´, Zhen Chen, Thea Djordjadze, Simon English, Jan Fabre, Liam Gillick, Group ABS, Ana Husıman, Manisha Jha, Jesper Just, Suhasini Kejrival, Raoul de Keyser, Alem Korkut, Eliseo Mattiacci, Annette Messager, Sarah Morris, Muntean/Rosenblum, Nunzio (Di Stefano), Tal R, Hans Hamid Rasmussen, Anselm Reyle, Pipilotti Rist, Arcangelo Sassolino, Viren Tanwar, Patrick Tuttofuocco, Shiv Verma, Silvio Vujicic, Heimo Zobernig

Art Education

The art education team offers guided tours through and workshops on the exhibition.
For the current calendar of events please access www.essl.museum / Art Education.

Catalogue

An exhibition catalogue will be published with texts by Prof. Karlheinz Essl and the involved directors.