The Bundeskunstsammlung - The Federal Collection of Contemporary Art

Contemporary art

Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...

, is a collection of modern works of art held by the government of the Federal Republic of Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. Based on the principle that creative arts play an important role in democratic society, it was founded in 1970 by Willy Brandt

Willy Brandt

Willy Brandt, born Herbert Ernst Karl Frahm , was a German politician, Mayor of West Berlin 1957–1966, Chancellor of West Germany 1969–1974, and leader of the Social Democratic Party of Germany 1964–1987....

 acting on a proposal by the then chairman of the German Federation of Artists. Although it contains works of Isa Genzken

Isa Genzken

Isa Genzken is a contemporary artist who lives and works in Berlin.-Education:Genzken studied fine arts and art history at the Hamburg University of Fine Arts from 1969–1971, the Berlin University of the Arts from 1971–1973, and Arts Academy Düsseldorf from 1973-1977. Genzken married German visual...

, Thomas Struth

Thomas Struth

Thomas Struth is a German photographer whose wide-ranging work includes depictions of detailed cityscapes, Asian jungles and family portraits. He is one of Germany's most widely exhibited and collected fine art photographers...

, Olafur Eliasson

Olafur Eliasson

Olafur Eliasson is a Danish-Icelandic artist known for sculptures and large-scale installation art employing elemental materials such as light, water, and air temperature to enhance the viewer’s experience. In 1995 he established Studio Olafur Eliasson in Berlin, a laboratory for spatial research...

, Jonathan Monk

Jonathan Monk

Jonathan Monk is an artist living and working in Berlin.-Art practice:Monk questions the meaning of art using conceptualism in a way that Ken Johnson in The New York Times called "sweet, wry and poetic"....

, Georg Baselitz

Georg Baselitz

Georg Baselitz is a German painter who studied in the former East Germany, before moving to what was then the country of West Germany...

, Markus Lüpertz

Markus Lüpertz

Markus Lüpertz is a contemporary German painter and sculptor.In the 1960s, Lüpertz worked primarily in Berlin, moving on to take a professorship at Karlsruhe at the Academy of Fine Arts Karlsruhe in the 1970s, then to Düsseldorf where he was for over twenty years director of the Kunstakademie...

, A. R. Penck, Markus Oehlen

Markus Oehlen

Markus Oehlen is a German artist. He studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf . His is formative participant of the German art movement Neue Wilde...

, Gerhard Richter

Gerhard Richter

Gerhard Richter is a German visual artist. Richter has simultaneously produced abstract and photorealistic painted works, as well as photographs and glass pieces, thus undermining the concept of the artist’s obligation to maintain a single cohesive style.- Biography :Gerhard Richter was born in...

, Wolfgang Tillmans

Wolfgang Tillmans

Wolfgang Tillmans is a German Fine-art photographer and artist. His comprehensive and diverse body of work is distinguished by observation of his surroundings and an ongoing investigation of the photographic medium’s foundations. In 2000, Tillmans was the first photographer and also the first...

and others, the collection does not have a central, permanent home; instead, the works are exhibited in various museums and government offices throughout the country.