Spring awakening at Munich's Museum Brandhorst: This show shines like sunshine!

Rosy: Achim Hochdörfer, head of the Museum Brandhorst, in front of Cy Twombly's peonies in the vestibule of the Rose Hall. © Marcus Schlaf

Munich's Museum Brandhorst is a virtuoso story of blossoming and decay. The new exhibition "La vie en rose" is a feast for fans of Cy Twombly, Gerhard Richter, Andy Warhol and Co.

You don't want to start with the weather again. But this spring really doesn't make it easy for us. So if you're still trudging through the puddles to the Museum Brandhorst on a wet and cold Tuesday, and just before the entrance the much too fast thick cart of some guy splashes the water from the curb gutter onto your clothes, you can't speak of a good mood. But then: the sun rises. And the heart at the same time. Museum director Achim Hochdörfer has prepared something very, very beautiful for us.

"La vie en rose". The title of the exhibition alone sets in motion a carousel of associations in the mind: Edith Piaf, the highest happiness in love. But also the resonating melancholy of Piaf, because even the greatest happiness ends at some point. Many artists have dealt with this dilemma over and over again. And no matter what culture or belief they are or were from, they often use flowers as a symbol of the contradictions of existence. Blossoming and decay – and so much life in between.

Flowery: During a Corona lockdown, the American Amy Sillman painted a number of flowers (left) © Marcus Schlaf

Achim Hochdörfer, who curated the new show, which will be on view from May 5, 2023, is still in the final stages of preparations when we meet him for a preliminary tour. He wears the matching sweater on his body, at the sight of which you briefly wonder whether it is still cool or already kitschy. They opt for cool kitschy and are happy that with him someone is now making sure that flowering in Munich is picking up speed. After all, it's high time. Although, in truth, this city is in full bloom all year round. This is what you realize during the tour: what a colorful bouquet this art city of Munich is. The majority of the works that now hang on the upper floor of the Museum Brandhorst are from the rich own collection or one of the other houses of the Bavarian State Painting Collections.

And that's why the museum director didn't have to think long about how he and his team would participate in this year's Flower Power Festival, which runs in Munich and the surrounding area until autumn. "My first thought was: We have the Rose Hall, we are part of the State Painting Collections. Let's make something out of it!"

Claude Monet's "Water Lilies" (1915) can also be seen in the exhibition. © Marcus Schlaf

That's what they did. Hochdörfer's house has 100 works by the painter Cy Twombly (1928-2011), one of the US artist's favourite subjects: roses. Twombly created a cycle for this purpose in 2008. Six monumental paintings hang in the Rose Hall. And as they shine into the room with all their color and form, they look like oversized spotlights. With full power, they illuminate the partition walls placed in the middle from all sides. The works hanging from it, in turn, reflect the beam of light back to Twombly in the most beautiful way. Like industrious bees, the works mutually enrich each other. And fans of the American suddenly see his roses in the confrontation with Gerhard Richter, Andy Warhol and Gabriele Münter with different eyes.

Cross and queer in the garden of art history has picked high villages. Always oriented towards the themes that Twombly cultivates in the monumental works. Based on well-known poems from Rilke to Dickinson, Twombly negotiates memory and longing, death and grief, sensuality and eroticism, joie de vivre and redemption, freedom and loneliness. For example, the dark purple-black roses, one of which was brutally cut off on one side, are juxtaposed with Gerhard Richter's "Flowers" (1994). The flower heads bent towards the ground. Red carnations, symbol of devotion and love. I guess that's over now. Richter is said to have painted the picture at the time when he separated from Isa Genzken. And high villages? On the back wall of the same screen hangs an installation by Isa Genzken with the resounding title "empire vampire V" (2003). It must have been a thieving pleasure for him, this personal game with becoming and passing away.

Pop Art meets Old Masters: Three times Andy Warhol's "Flowers" and Giuseppe Arcimboldo's "Allegory of Spring" (bottom left). © Marcus Schlaf

0

Also Read

Full boom: Charles III treats himself to this music for his coronation

READ

Hard and colorful - the classic LPs of the Scorpions are coming out again

READ

Til Schweiger: Verdi also speaks of "violence against persons"

READ

Heino covers Mickie Krause's "10 naked hairdressers" - and Hannelore is shocked!

READ

Udo Lindenberg and Apache 207 hit like a comet!

READ

Fancy a voyage of discovery?

My Area

Or Warhol: the curator would also have had large-format works by the Pop Art artist from the extensive Brandhorst collection at his disposal; but deliberately opted for the almost 13 by 13 centimeter small "Flowers" (1965). There they hang, like dandelions floating in the landscape, between Giuseppe Arcimboldo's "Allegory of Spring" (1563) and "The Holy Family" (ca. 1620/23) by Jan Brueghel the Elder and Pieter van Avont. It's as if Warhol had plucked the flowers directly from the phenomenal works of the Old Masters – and helped them grow wildly with modern fertiliser. In short, you drag yourself out of the water into this show – and dance out again exhilaratingly. Like rain dance, only the other way around. Until October 22, 2023 at Museum Brandhorst, Tue.-Sun. 10 a.m.-18 p.m., Thur. until 20 p.m.