Pontus Hultén

Pontus Hultén with Gae Aulenti (1986)

Pontus Hultén , actually Karl Gunnar (born June 21, 1924 - October 26, 2006 in Stockholm ) was a Swedish art historian, university professor, art collector, founding director of six important museums and one of the most important exhibition organizers of the 20th century. In professional circles he was considered visionary and unorthodox.

life and work

In 1996, Pontus Hultén was the founding director of the Tinguely Museum in Basel, designed by the Ticino architect Mario Botta . In 1954 he met the Swiss painter and sculptor Jean Tinguely (1925–1991) in Paris and accompanied him throughout his life.

In 1958, Hultén was founding director of the Moderna Museet in Stockholm (1957–1973 worked there) and founding director of the Center Georges Pompidou in Paris and the art and exhibition hall of the Federal Republic of Germany in the Museum Mile in Bonn (1992). His most important and groundbreaking special exhibitions include Paris - New York (1977), Paris - Berlin (1978) and Paris - Moscow (1979) in the Center Georges Pompidou as well as in Stockholm's Moderna Museet 4 Americans (1962), which is the first work of Robert Rauschenberg (1925–2008, Pop Art ) and Jasper Johns (* 1930, Pop Art) brought to Europe, in 1963 a highly acclaimed retrospective of Jackson Pollock (1912–1956, Abstract Expressionism ) and action painting, and in 1968 the first worldwide Retrospective by Andy Warhol (1928–1987, Pop Art). Even before the fall of the Iron Curtain , his presentations made him a sought-after cultural ambassador.

In 1981 Hultén founded the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles and was director of the Palazzo Grassi in Venice , where he presented the first ever exhibition in 1986.

His artist friends included especially Niki de Saint Phalle , Jean Tinguely , Claes Oldenburg , Sam Francis and Rebecca Horn .

In 2005, Pontus Hultén donated his private collection of around 700 works to Stockholm's Moderna Museet, which he himself divided into three sections: Pontus' friends (with mainly artists of his generation who had been developing new artistic concepts since the 1950s / 60s), Hultén im Spiegel (combines very personal works and portraits dedicated to the art historian, among others by Roberto Matta and Piotr Kowalski ) as well as Between Signs and Drawing (with very high-quality graphic works, at the same time the heart of the collection, with works by Max Ernst , Kasimir Malewitsch , Marcel Duchamp and Constantin Brâncuși ).

Publications

• Niki de Saint Phalle . Special edition school book. Hatje Cantz Verlag, 1995.
• Machine as Seen at the End of the Mechanical Age. Museum of Modern Art, New York 1968, ISBN 978-0870-70440-6 .
• (Pref.): Brancusi. photograph. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Center National d'Art Moderne Georges Pompidou, Paris 1982, ISBN 2-85850-025-8 .
• with Natalia Dumitresco , Alexandre Istrati : Brancusi. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3-608-76226-4 .
• with Henriette Hahnloser: Museum Jean Tinguely Basel. The collection. Benteli Verlag, 1996, ISBN 3-7165-1043-2 . (This documentation of the collection includes the most important works of the important Swiss iron sculptor).
• with Mario Botta , Niki de Saint Phalle , Margrit Hahnloser, Andres Pardey: Museum Jean Tinguely Basel. English version. Benteli Verlag 1996, ISBN 3-7165-1051-3 . (Documentation of the collection of the newly opened museum with consideration of aesthetic aspects of the museum building).
• with Niki de Saint Phalle, Michel de Grèce, Ulrich Krempel : Niki de Saint Phalle. Monograph. Pictures, shooting pictures, assemblages, reliefs. 1949-2000. Benteli Verlag, 2001, ISBN 3-716-51258-3 .

literature

• Lars Nittve (Vorw.): Collections. The Pontus Hultén Collection. Stockholm, Moderna Museet , Stockholm 2004. 447 pp. (With numerous informative letters, photos and souvenirs).

Web links

• Literature by and about Pontus Hultén in the catalog of the German National Library
• Special exhibition in the Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt 2007