Jungbrunnen für alte Meister? Interventionen zeitgenössischer Künstler in Museen alter Kunst

Abstract

For almost twenty years now, museums of old masters invite contemporary artists to intervene in their rooms. The artists arrange special or permanent exhibitions using their own works and /or works from the collections of the museum. This paper traces the development of these interventions since ca. 1960. The period in question can be divided in two phases. Until the 1990s, contemporary movements such as institutional or museum critique, activism and artistic research shaped the interventions. Since 2000, the visitor experience, the diversification of the offer of the museums and the art market influence the programs and concepts of exhibitions. Three chapters about the relationship between "old" and "new" in museums and on the market and about the relationship between artists and curators complete the historic description.