Agenda

The exhibition examines the history and themes of the Im Obersteg collection of the museum in its broader context. The show inquires into the reception of Marc Chagall’s early oeuvre in Basel, the discovery of Chaïm Soutine in Paris, Alexej von Jawlensky’s difficult final years during the Second World War and the acquisition and sale of works by Picasso. Karl Im Obersteg (1883-1969) was a private collector of art, diplomat and entrepreneur. Selected loans will accentuate the key themes of the collection. Picasso’s monumental painting Arlequin assis (1923), for example, which was the Im Obersteg Collection’s pièce de résistance for many years, but was sold by the heir of the owner to pay the inheritance tax in 1969. This work is shown alongside its twin, the Basler Arlequin assis by Picasso (1923). It is for the first times in fifty years that the Arlequin is back in Basel.

The newspapers experienced good times from the beginning of the nineteenth century. Weeklies and other magazines then went through a golden age in the 20th century. The rise of radio and television was a challenge for these media. Nowadays, the Internet is a serious competitor. Political cartoons have always been an integral part of this press. The caricature has played a prominent and essential role from the beginning of the printed media and has always been a popular political instrument. However, the cartoon is also under pressure, and the Swiss caricaturist Patrick Chappatte (1967) expresses his concerns publicly. The exhibition addresses this discussion and places Chappatte’s works in the spotlight.
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The poet Paul Éluard (1895–1952), the publisher Gérald Cramer (1916–1991) and the artist Joan Miró (1893–1983) produced one of the most exceptional artist’s books of the 20th century in 1958. Éluard wrote the poems between 1929 and 1930. Éditions surréalistes published these texts in 1930, but it was only in 1947, that the project of publishing the poems as an artist’s book with illustrations by Joan Miró was born.

Miró came up with the idea of making the publication a polychrome sculpture as much as a book. He made 233 woodcuts, which were carved and printed in colour. With the poems, they form a series of landscapes of words and images. The book was published in 1958 in an edition of just 130 copies and shown for the first time at Galerie Berggruen in Paris. Cooperating with the Fundació Joan Miró, the Fondation will tell the story of this splendid publication through correspondence, photographs, woodcuts, and the six conserved mock-ups. Four copies of the original edition on display allow a view all of the pages.