WALID RAAD

Walid Raad’s project at the Kunsthaus Zürich sheds light on key questions about museums in the 21st century. It questions what specific forms of storytelling museums make possible today and what art institutions stand for when the distinction between private and public collections is blurring. Raad deals with the untold stories and gaps as well as the silences inscribed within the exhibited objects and how these can be revealed and conveyed. The exhibition mirrors current changes in societal values and pinpoints the major challenges facing cultural institutions in the 21st century. These are especially relevant to the Kunsthaus Zürich, as the issue of how to deal with the Emil Bührle collection has shown. Raad proceeds from the proliferation of public and private, Western and non-Western art collections and museums. His emphasis is as much on the worldly forces that condition their forms, as it is on the “otherworldly,” intangible, and counter-intuitive cracks they manifest.

The starting point for his current project is the collection of Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza, which has been on display in Madrid since 1993. The Thyssen-Bornemisza collection is also closely linked to Switzerland. More broadly, the Kunsthaus Zürich has close ties to private collectors dating back to the early years of the 20th century, ranging from the donations of the Hans Schuler and Ottilie W. Roederstein collections in 1920 to the long-term loan of the Looser collection since 2021. With his exhibition in the Kunsthaus Zürich, Walid Raad imagines yet another sale, transfer, and display of a private collection in a public museum. The artist explores an imaginary world in which parts of the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection end up in the Kunsthaus Zurich.