Gregor Schneider will realise his new work KUNSTMUSEUM for the Ruhrtriennale in Bochum.

22 July 2014

Opening on 29th August 2014 at the Kunstmuseum Bochum.

Gregor Schneider will realise a new work for the Ruhrtriennale at the Kunstmuseum Bochum. Under the title KUNSTMUSEUM he will investigate the location and function of the art museum. Following the cancellation of his planned site specific sculpture totlast for the Lehmbruck Museum in Duisburg by the Lord Mayor of the city of Duisburg, realising this work in Bochum is a considerable achievement. The exhibition will open on 29th August, two weeks after the beginning of the festival, but will remain open after the festival in October.

"I am looking forward to closing the main entrance of the museum. Taking us through a new entrance – „a waste pipe“  – into hidden spaces inside the museum, into a remote world within the museum which is not normally accessible.”
(Gregor Schneider in an e-mail to Heiner Goebbels in July 2014)

For KUNSTMUSEUM Gregor Schneider inserts an new construction into the museum in Bochum, thus entirely altering the building’s form, function and appearance. For the duration of the installation KUNSTMUSEUM visitors will enter the museum through a new entrance. Through this “back door”, spaces including existing function rooms will become accessible to visitors which they are not usually allowed to enter.  The sequence of spaces creates a literally inverted architectonic course through a museum in a museum.

Heiner Goebbels, Artistic Director of the Ruhrtriennale: „We are delighted that despite the circumstances Gregor Schneider has been able to develop a large new work for the Ruhrtriennale in KUNSTMUSEUM. That we are able to open the exhibition in such a short time is thanks above all to our partners. In addition to Gregor Schneider I would like to pass on heartfelt thanks to Museum Director Hans Günter Golinski and everyone else of the city of Bochum who has made this possible.”


Gregor Schneider is interested in the effects of socially relevant spaces and in what they communicate beyond the visible. His spaces are reconstructions of existing rooms, in which the observer barely has a chance to view the work in its entirety: walls are built in front of walls, rooms inside rooms, objects are invisibly walled in, or parts of the room move imperceptibly. Things which are hermetically sealed, buried or hidden play a central role in his works.

No other artist has focussed in such a decisive way upon space and the manifold levels on which it can be perceived. Whether in Totes Haus u r (Venice 2001), Die Familie Schneider (London 2004) or most recently Hauptstraße 85 a (Stommeln, 2014), Schneider‘s works are characterized by a distorted vision of normality. They are imaginative spaces, which function like catalysts and confront visitors in an existential manner with themselves.

Gregor Schneider (born 5th April 1969 in Rheydt, now Mönchengladbach-Rheydt) is a visual artist.  His main work, the Haus u r / Totes Haus u r 1985 – heute, is regarded as one of the most significant contemporary installations, for which he was awarded the Golden Lion at the 2001 Venice Biennale.

What to do with tickets for Duisburg
There will be no Ruhrtriennale events at the Lehmbruck Museum Duisburg in 2014.  The discussion with the artist on 14th September has also been moved to Kunstmuseum Bochum. Tickets which have already been purchased for the Lehmbruck Museum remain valid for the installation in Bochum. Alternatively, they can be returned immediately: patrons can be refunded for tickets they have already purchased by filling in a form available on the Ruhrtriennale website.

Tickets for KUNSTMUSEUM are now available online at www.ruhrtriennale.de and from all the Ruhrtriennale’s other advance sales outlets. Patrons who have purchased tickets in advance have priority entry.