MKM Museum Küppersmühle für Moderne Kunst

Description

Located on Duisburg’s Innenhafen is the MKM Museum Küppersmühle für Moderne Kunst, a museum dedicated to German art from the 1950s to the present. The museum is operated by the Stiftung für Kunst und Kultur e. V. in Bonn.

The building traces its origins to a grain store whose industrial complex gradually expanded in the 19th and 20th centuries. Established in the mid-19th century, a milling facility stood on this site, which in the early 20th century was replaced by a multi-storey new building and later augmented by annexes, a freestanding boiler-house section and tall steel silos. After the mill was closed in the 1970s, a citizens’ initiative saved the structure from demolition; parts of the ensemble were later adapted for use as restaurants and offices.

In 1999 the museum opened in the former grain warehouse with approximately 3,600 m² of exhibition space; conversion plans were drawn up by a Basel-based architectural firm. The starting point was a collection of more than 800 works by over 40 German artists. Following a later acquisition the holdings grew significantly; today the collection comprises around 1,500 works, presenting visitors with rotating works and groups of works by major German artists from the postwar period to the present. The collection includes, among others, works by Hanne Darboven, Georg Baselitz, Candida Höfer, Anselm Kiefer, Imi Knoebel, Sigmar Polke and Gerhard Richter.

In addition to the permanent exhibition, the programme each year includes several temporary exhibitions, among them retrospectives, thematic group shows and presentations of current positions. Special projects have ranged from international loans to cross-regional exhibition collaborations.

A long-planned extension over the historic silos ran into considerable difficulties for a time due to structural defects and financing problems. After the financing was reorganised and a foundation for the institution was established, construction work resumed. A four-storey annex, which for the first time opens the silo wing to visitors and significantly increases the exhibition space, was completed and opened in 2021.