The Deutsche Guggenheim, which celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2007, is a unique collaboration between the Guggenheim Foundation and Deutsche Bank, and is widely regarded by both locals and visitors from around the world as one of the most exciting and experimental art museums in Germany.
On November 7, 1997, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and Deutsche Bank celebrated the public opening of the Deutsche Guggenheim, a 350-square-meter exhibition space designed by American architect Richard Gluckman and located on the ground level of Deutsche Bank’s Berlin offices, a historic building on Unter den Linden, a major avenue in what was formerly East Berlin. Now after more than a decade, the Deutsche Guggenheim is widely regarded by both locals and visitors from around the world as one of the most exciting and experimental art museums in Berlin. The Guggenheim Foundation and Deutsche Bank have recently reaffirmed their mutual commitment to collaborate on programming and exhibitions at the Deutsche Guggenheim.
Perhaps most uniquely, the Deutsche Guggenheim annually commissions one, or occasionally two, new artworks or series by contemporary artists, which are debuted in exhibitions organized in collaboration with the selected artist and one or more Guggenheim Museum curators, and accompanied by a catalogue and related programming. Over time, many of these works have been shown in New York and Bilbao and some have entered the Guggenheim Foundation’s permanent collection.
A number of the commissions represent a continuation of the Guggenheim Foundation’s existing commitments to particular artists, while others have afforded the opportunity to establish new working relationships. The thirteen artists who have participated in the series to date—John Baldessari, Hanne Darboven, Anish Kapoor, William Kentridge, Jeff Koons, Gerhard Richter, James Rosenquist, Andreas Slominski, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Bill Viola, Jeff Wall, Phoebe Washburn, Lawrence Weiner, and Rachel Whiteread—comprise various nationalities, genders, and generations, and work in a diversity of media.
