Kunstsammlung Henning J. Claassen

Description

In Lüneburg, the Henning J. Claassen Art Collection was opened as a Museum of Modern Art on 1 September 2022. The house displays a private collection of contemporary painting, works on paper and sculpture that the Lüneburg entrepreneur and honorary citizen Henning J. Claassen assembled over decades on business trips.

The collection grew over a period of more than fifty years and was transferred in 2018 to the non-profit Stiftung Kunstsammlung Henning J. Claassen. The works were first presented in the public areas of his then-operating companies. In 2010 he opened the Galerie im Alten Kaufhaus in Lüneburg; in 2017 the Kunstgalerie Parkhotel de Wiemsel followed, located in the park of the hotel of the same name in Ootmarsum (Netherlands). After the Galerie im Alten Kaufhaus closed, the collector had a new museum building designed according to his specifications.

The cubic new building, completed in 2022, features a travertine stone façade. The collections are shown across 700 m² of accessible exhibition space; there is a café in the foyer.

The collection comprises more than 500 works and cannot be assigned to a single style or period. It includes major positions in contemporary art, with works by Gerhard Richter, Günther Uecker, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Helmut Newton and Sam Jinks. Complementing the permanent display, around 100 rotating works are presented each year, continually renewing the experience of the collection’s diversity.