From 30 May to 5 September 2010, the Groninger Museum will present the exhibition entitled Now, in the former Groninger Museum! 100 years of collecting 1894 -1994. The exhibition is on display in the former Groninger Museum on the Praediniussingel in Groningen. The present Groninger Museum building will be closed for renovation between 12 April and 18 December 2010.
During the summer months, while the Groninger Museum is temporarily closed for renovation, the Museum will display a selection from its own collection in the former Groninger Museum building on the Praediniussingel. These premises were built for the Groninger Museum in 1894, and continued to accommodate the Groninger Museum until the new building on Museumeiland was opened in 1994. Besides this function, the former Groninger Museum building also served as the Museum of Natural History and is now occupied by Academy Minerva (Art Academy) of the Hanzehogeschool University of Applied Sciences. In anticipation of a planned renovation in the autumn, the Hanzehogeschool has made the premises available for an exhibition featuring works from the Groninger Museum collection.
The exhibition will present a choice from the collecting activities that have taken place in the building on the Praediniussingel in the last hundred years. Accordingly, the exhibition consists of a small selection of contemporary art characteristic of the policies of three consecutive directors: paintings by artists such as Jakob Smits and Herman Kruyder, acquired during the directorships of Jos de Gruyter (1955-1963) and Bram Westers (1963-1978), with works from the New Figuration by Lucassen, and the geometric abstracts by Struycken. At the same time, the Museum will present furniture by Mendini and Sottsass and others, from the Frans Haks period (1978-1995). In addition, work by De Ploeg will also be on show, as well as 17th and 18th-century painting and applied art from Groningen. Besides several well-known masterpieces, art that has seldom been exhibited in the Groninger Museum in the past few years will now be on show, such as works by the 19th-century Groningen painters Eerelman and Egenberger. A small tribute will be paid to the former Museum of Natural History with the exhibition entitled ‘Animals in Art’, on display in the basement.
‘Shortly, in the former Groninger Museum!’ In September 2010, Hanze University of Applied Sciences will initiate the preparations to accommodate the Academy of Art, Design and Pop Culture in the monumental museum building on the Praediniussingel. In the near future, Academie Minerva (the art academy) will combine places of work and education with public exhibition areas within the building. In June 2011, graduating students will present their final projects here, and from September 2011 onward the building will be in function in its full glory as the Academy of Art!