Brush drawings by Josef Hegenbarth
and traditional Chinese brush painting

Chosen works of the Museum für Asiatische Kunst der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin and the Josef-Hegenbarth-Archiv, Kupferstich-Kabinett der Staatlichen Kunstsammlungen Dresden at Hegenbarth Sammlung Berlin

Opening: Wednesday, 21. February 2018, 19—21 
Opening workshop for children with (grand)parents: Sunday, 25. February 2018, 12—14 

Open: Tuesday—Friday, 12—16 and by appointment

Sunday matinee: 18. March, 15. April, 13. May (11—14)
guided tour 11.30
Artist workshop Chinese calligraphy: 22. April (13.30—15)
and 13. May (14—15.30) with the artist Andreas Schmid
International Museums Day: 13. May (11—14)

Friday, 30. March 2018 closed

Two ink drawings with dedications by Guan Liang are included in Josef Hegenbarth´s estate. Whether the Chinese artist, who travelled through the GDR with a delegation of artists in the autumn of 1957, met his East German colleague Hegenbarth personally, and how he influenced him both aesthetically and stylistically, above all in his brush drawings, is the theme of the exhibition.

There were also other publications on East Asian art and artefacts among Hegenbarth’s possessions. Therefore it can be assumed that he thoroughly dealt with aesthetics, techniques and motifs of this culture. East Asian elements appear in many of Hegenbarth’s pictures over the decades.

In order to cast more light this subject from an Eastern perspective, the Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin has loaned precious works such as scroll painting and album pages from its rich collections, such as scrolls and album leaves by Guan Liang (1900—1986), Li Keran (1907—1989), Wang Xuetao (1903—1982), Guo Xu (1456—1532), Gao Fenghan (1683—1749) and Wen Shu (1595—1634) for this exhibition. They are complemented by objects from the Josef-Hegenbarth-Archiv in Dresden which also illustrate Hegenbarth’s affinity to East Asian art.

With selected examples from its own collections, the Hegenbarth Sammlung Berlin sets out to demonstrate how Chinese influences and an artistic affinity to traditional ink painting is apparent in Hegenbarth’s work. Whereas there are only vague references in the extensive literature on Hegenbarth, the Hegenbarth Sammlung Berlin is the first institution to undertake a focussed comparison.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a workbook with an art historical commentary (German/English) by Uta Rahman-Steinert, Museum für Asiatische Kunst Berlin.

Preview

The Hegenbarth Sammlung Berlin is launching a series of exhibitions, which will be continued during the early summer of 2018 with aesthetically or thematically related works by contemporary artists, such as Thomas Baumhekel (Dresden), Corinne Laroche (Paris) and Heinz Handschick (Berlin).