The City of Culture Winterthur is back in all its Glory
27 March 2024
Switzerland is a country of museums, art and culture. Although the ancient Confederation (Eidgenossenschaft) of cantons did not have a “Golden Age” of art, artistic achievements are omnipresent.
Not only its food products (Maggi, Knorr, Muesli, chocolate, cheese, among others), architecture, graffiti, broderies and other textiles, watches, shoes, ceramics, or hair combs are world-famous, but also generations of art collectors and scholars of the history of art.
It is no coincidence that the first museum, even if this name was unknown at the time, was founded in Basel in 1671. The combination of cosmopolitan merchants, manufacturers, and scientists, as well as a widespread system and mentality of mecenate, are at the heart of today’s cultural scene.
Vincent van Gogh, Le Café de nuit à Arles, 1888. Collection: Kunst Museum Winterthur, Hahnloser/Jaeggli Stiftung
It also applies to the city of Winterthur (Canton of Zurich). On 23 March, the Kunst Museum Winterthur celebrated the long-awaited return of the collection of Hedy Bühler (1873-1952) and Arthur Hahnloser (1870-1936) to the Villa Flora.
The couple from Winterthur bought directly from artists’ studios after 1907, initially works by Giovanni Giacometti, then Ferdinand Hodler and from 1908 onwards from artists and art dealers in Paris and Amsterdam. They bought the Van Goghs at auctions in Amsterdam.
Parisian avant-garde artists regularly travelled to Winterthur and visited the couple’s home, Villa Flora. Established in 1980, the Hahnloser/Jaeggli Foundation (Stiftung) comprises about 400 works. After years of renovation, the masterpieces are back home in the villa.
The exhibition Bienvenue! shows the rise of French Modernism from Impressionism and Post-Impressionism to representatives of the Nabi group of artists and the so-called Fauves.
Edouard Manet, Amazone, 1882. Collection: Kunst Museum Winterthur, Hahnloser/Jaeggli Stiftung
Works by Vincent van Gogh, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Édouard Manet and Auguste Renoir and groups of works by their Parisian artist friends around Pierre Bonnard, Félix Vallotton, Odilon Redon and Henri Matisse are presented. Sculptures by Auguste Rodin, Aristide Maillol and other sculptures complete the collection.
The Kunststadt Winterthur (in addition to the Kunst Museum Winterthur, especially the Oskar Reinhart collection “am Römerholz“) shines again in all its glory!
View of the exhibition ‘Bienvenue!’. Collection and Photo: Kunst Museum Winterthur, Hahnloser/Jaeggli Stiftung