Today, I'm really happy to present to you a new format on my website. This time it's not a presentation and a review of an exhibition, but rather a spotlight of an unknown treasure in the art scene of Switzerland.
For the first article of this series, I've decided to focus on the "Sammlung Rosengart" in the Swiss city of Luzern. Situated five minutes away from the train station and the Kunstmuseum Luzern, the collection present to the visitors more or less then 300 Classic Modernist and Impressionist works of art presented in a former building of the Swiss National Bank since March 2002 (after a small renovation and adaptation of the place by the Basel architect Roger Diener).
The history of a family of
art dealers and collectors
2. Pierre Bonnard - Fishermen in a Boat, Brittany - 1907
The collection Rosengart came to be by Siegfried Rosengart (1894 - 1985), an art collector and gallery owner born in Munich in Germany.
Siegfried came in contact with the art field when his uncle Joseph visited the Summer Exhibition of the Art in Cologne in 1912, who presented many of the avant-garde and the artists of the time such as Picasso, Braque, Modigliani, etc.
When he decided to study abroad and leave Germany in 1913, he moves to Paris and met Picasso through Wilhelm Uhde. The uncle of Wilhelm Uhde, Heinrich Thannhauser one of the most important art collector and dealer of the time was persuaded by Siegfried Rosengart to buy Picasso's "Les Saltimbanques" from 1905 (now the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.) at auction.
After the war Rosengard helped his uncle in his gallery and he opened a branch of his gallery in Lucerne in 1920, which he managed independently until 1937.
During 17 years he presented numerous artists and masterpieces such as Klee, Picasso, Matisse, Modigliani, Léger, Seurat, Monet, Manet, etc.
After the Second World War, the situation and strategy changed. With his daughter Angela Rosengart, who became an employee of the gallery in 1948 and a partner in 1957, he sold works of art to museums such as the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf and to collectors all over the world, including Etta and Claribel Cone (Gauguin, Matisse, Picasso) and Samuel Courtauld (Manet). He also worked as a consultant for two art collectors Bernhard Sprengel and Peter Ludwig.
Since the 70s they thought about giving back part of their personal collection to Switzerland. At first his daughter donated a Picasso painting to the Kunsthaus Zürich in 1971, and in 1978 they presented eight important works to the city of Lucerne in the historic “Am-Rhyn-Haus”. 14 years later a group of 200 Picasso photographs made by David Douglas Duncan was added to the small permanent exhibition.
After the death of Siegfried Rosengart in 1985, the daughter continued the gallery and in 1992 established a charitable foundation with the aim of preserving her and her father's collection in its entirety and presenting it to the public in a museum.
In March 2002 the project was inaugurated in a former building of the Swiss National Bank in Lucerne.
The building and the collection
In March 2002, the museum opened in the former building of the Swiss National Bank, and the citizen of Luzern and its surrounding discover the collection of the Rosengart. During the first year of opening, 91 205 visitors came to see the collection, including the first floor comprising of 47 works of Pablo Picasso (ranging from his blue period to his last work), the work of Paul Klee on the basement of the museum and a selection of modern and impressionist works on the upper level of the building. All in all, the museum present more or less then 300 works, all of them on display and all the time, due to the law of the foundation.
The core of the collection is the oeuvre of Pablo Picasso, due the connection the artist had the Gallery Rosengart but also to the current owner of the museum. When she was young, the artist portrayed Angela Rosenberg five times.
Another important connection was to Paul Klee. For her 17th birthday, Angela didn't want any gift, but she preferred to buy her first art piece from his father gallery "Ein Tier geht spazieren" (An animal takes a walk) by Paul Klee.
A few highlights
3. Amedeo Modigliani - Portrait of Henri Laurens, sitting - 1915
Paul Cézanne, a French born painter is quite an important figure in the collection. In the museum you have three different works, a still-life titled "Milk-Jug and Lemon" from 1879, a beautiful landscape titled "L'Estaque, the Village and the Sea" from 1882 and a famous study for his "Bathers" from 1900-1906.
The second highlight is this beautiful seated portrait of the artist Henri Laurens made by Amedeo Modigliani. It's quite rare to see the work of Modigliani in Switzerland, and I was so impressed and happy to see this beautiful portrait of a man, and not one of his nudes.
Thirdly, you might already know my passion for Georges Seurat. In the collection, the Rosengart have two beautiful "Croqueton" by the French artist. The first one being "Bathers: the Seine at Asnières or Courbevoie Bridge" made in 1883, when he was preparing his first pointillist painting "Bathers at Asnières " (National Gallery, London).
And the second one titled "La Grande Jatte: the White Dog " made in 1884 is one of the 34 sketches the artist produced in connection with his monumental painting "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte" (Art Institute of Chicago).
Informations about the Sammlung Rosengart
Pilatusstrasse 10
CH-6003 Luzern
Phone: +41 41 220 16 60
Mail: info@rosengart.ch