Minimalism and After III

The Minimalism and After exhibition series was conceived in 2000, as Minimalism is one of the key areas in the Mercedes-Benz Art Collection’s long-term purchasing strategy. We now see that we anticipated the most important 2004 exhibition trends. Several major museum shows, from Los Angeles to Houston, New York and London are currently devoted to Minimalism and Geometrical Abstraction as an important phenomenon in Europe and the USA around 1960. Many of the names we come across here have featured in the Mercedes-Benz Art Collection’s exhibitions since 2001 in Berlin, Karlsruhe, Detroit and Pretoria.

Our Minimalism and After exhibition series is based on the idea that a transatlantic history of the effect made by abstract-geometrical, reduced image-/object-forms has to be rediscovered. This history starts with the ‘emigration’ of the Bauhaus and Constructivism in the 1930s, and the way they were received in the USA. It continues in the 1950s through the dialogue between American forms anticipating Minimalism and the ZERO and New Tendencies developments in Europe. Minimalism and After III concentrates on a dialogue between American and German artists. A total of 27 artistic positions are presented in the exhibition, with about 60 works from five decades.