Pinakothek der Moderne
A design piece by Colani, suspended over the stairs to the design section of the museum
The 500 figurines made out of chocolate wrapping paper
Rubens seems to paint his dragons with heads that are upside down
A teeny Rembrandt tronie, or face study
The gigantic Alte Pinakothek (currently only half open because of renovations)
And its gigantic paintings in it
A videographer with a mini dolly outside of the Pinakothek der Moderne
We woke up to gray skies, but the weather turned out to be more cooperative than forecast–the rain stayed away for most of the day and was never more than a drizzle while we had a day that was a mix of museums and walks through the city. Kai decided to stay behind for the first half of the day, and Imke met her friend Karl at 10:30 near the museum district for an outing of her own, so it was just Mark, Dorothee, and I who went to the two modern art museums–the Sammlung Brandhorst and the Pinakothek der Moderne. The Brandhorst collection is currently mostly closed, but it does feature an important collection of Cy Twombly’s paintings, photographs, and statues. Twombly is not really my cup of tea, but Dorothee explained some of his art really well, and one series of 12 paintings about the battle of Lepanto, in a room that the artist was able to design with the museum curators, was actually really impressive/memorable. After our brief walk through this exhibit, we went to the Pinakothek der Moderne, which picks up where yesterday’s museum stopped–with some early 20th century art, including Kandinsky and Marc, but also with some paintings by Max Ernst–still one of my absolutely favorite painters–by Picasso, and then many abstract expressionists and other, more intriguing modern artists. The most arresting piece was a huge table with tiny little aluminum figurines–500 of them, made by 500 Japanese steel workers out of the wrappers of 500 German-style chocolate bars. The artist asked them to eat the chocolate and then make something out of the silver paper! The result was really awesome. Otherwise, we also really loved the basement section (which I remembered vividly from an earlier visit) — it is dedicated to modern design, of completely different things, from teapots and chairs to cars, computers, and even engines. Industrial design fascinates me, especially when it comes to kitchen stuff and bookshelves, but I was glad that Mark also had some computer “shells” etc. to look at.
We met back up with Dorothee and also with Imke at about 2 pm, and Kai joined us from home just after we had finished eating yummy, cheap Vietnamese food near Theresienstrasse. Then, Imke and Dorothee took Kai shopping (he bought a pair of shorts at H&M), while Mark and I walked back to the Alte Pinakothek, the museum with the oldest painting–just for a quick look, not for a more in-depth visit. The museum is enormous, but only maybe 100 paintings (as opposed to the many hundreds!) are currently on display. Lots of very fleshy Rubens, a few Rembrandts, and lots of overwhelmingly large biblical and Greek mythology paintings. There were some Dutch pub scenes from the Dutch masters, but unfortunately not a single Vermeer… We only spent about 45 minutes, and then walked from the museum district to the downtown area, and had some coffee and gelato, eventually meeting the others at Viktualienmarkt. We took the subway home and then had our last Abendbrot in our vacation rental, with a lovely big salad. I can’t say we ever really got used to the deficiencies of the apartment (even after we were actually supplied with more plates, glasses, and chairs), but we made do! Now we are getting packed for tomorrow’s departure for Prague.