Works in Progress. Giving the collection its place
14.12.2023 – 12.04.2024

Collections are not only the product of targeted acquisitions or donations of art, they above all relate social and historical circumstances. Collections are alive, collections need to be protected. When we look at collections today, our view is always situated in time. Therefore, dealing with them can raise new questions and prompt us to approach their traces and circumstances in different ways.
In the course of digitizing the collection of the Kunstverein Bremerhaven, numerous forays through the archive were undertaken and objects, prints and paintings were gradually brought out of the depot to photograph them. Especially during, before and after these forays, the staff’s view of the collections changed: An object falls into their hands that urgently needs to be restored; an invitation card to an exhibition opening was mistakenly stored in the cabinet of editions. And then there are recurring questions: Has this work already been photographed and, above all, in the right way? Is it located in its correct place?
With “Works in Progress. Giving the Collection its Place,” the team of the Kunsthalle and Kunstmuseum Bremerhaven publically takes stock its own collection and provides insights into the processes of archival work and the museum’s infrastructures. Visitors are invited to move about in the collection, gain a new perspective on it and accompany the team and invited guests during individuals steps of the inventory. Works of art will be presented that we have been taken from the stocks and are waiting to be identified, inventoried and photographed. To this end, the Kunsthalle will temporarily become both a work and exhibition space.