September 30, 2016 – January 29, 2017 MKM Museum Küppersmühle for Modern Art, Duisburg

From October 2016, the MKM will be showing two influential artistic personalities in a joint exhibition: Georg Baselitz, the internationally acclaimed German painter and sculptor, and Emilio Vedova, one of the most important representatives of European Art Informel. An intense personal friendship and artistic esteem connected the two from the 1960s until Vedova’s death in 2006. The two artists were presented together for the first time at the Venice Biennale the following year.

The emotional connection, which finds its counterpart in the highly subjective, expressive painting style of the artists, is the starting point for the exhibition BASELITZ – VEDOVA at the MKM Museum Küppersmühle, which also establishes links to the museum’s collection.

Emilio Vedova brings the Informel focus of the collection to the exhibition, while Georg Baselitz is represented in the MKM collection with one of the largest museum holdings of the artist ever. Two of his rarely shown, extensive series are on display: Kleines Straßenbild and Ciao America – works for which Baselitz, a storyteller, uses a highly abstract formal language.

However, the focus is on a new series of works from 2015: Ma grigio. Black, white and countless shades of gray dominate these paintings – a reminiscence of Vedova, as do the mostly Italian titles within the series. The pictures are in an exciting dialog with Vedova’s powerful, gesturally urgent paintings from the 1980s, his late artistic phase.

Credits: Baselitz – Vedova, MKM 2016, © Stiftung ür Kunst und Kultur, Photos: Georg Lukas, Essen

The exhibition BASELITZ – VEDOVA is a cooperation with the Fondazione Emilio e Annabianca Vedova. The curators are Fabrizio Gazzarri and Walter Smerling. The exhibition is made possible by the support of Evonik Industries AG.

Press photos
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Guided tours
Every Sunday at 3 pm through the exhibition and the collection as well as individually bookable.