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The Guelph Treasure and Other Highlights from the Kunstgewerbemuseum Medieval Collection Are Back on View

28.08.2024
Kunstgewerbemuseum

After the Kunstgewerbemuseum’s (Museum of Decorative Arts) Medieval Collection was dismantled in March 2024 in the course of redesigning the permanent exhibition, many of the collection’s world-famous highlights, including the Guelph Treasure, can now be viewed in a temporary presentation until spring 2026.

The exhibition in Room III at the Kunstgewerbemuseum shows not only famous collection ensembles such as the Guelph Treasure but also offers new perspectives on lesser-known objects such as Italian goldsmithery, late medieval furniture and one of the rare private devotional altars dating from the transition to the Renaissance.

The exhibition is divided into different thematic areas, beginning with a section on the design of reliquaries, a key task of medieval craftsmen. Examples from a broad range of genres and regions illustrate the development of reliquaries and portable altars and the increasing importance of enamelling associated with them. In turn, the presentation of the Guelph Treasure that follows makes use of an unusually rich collection of such containers to illustrate the far-reaching cultural connections of an important collegiate church over the centuries. Further areas of interest, including secular works and sacred art, demonstrate the full breadth of the medieval collection. In addition to objects from the Treasury of Basel Cathedral, this includes the previously lesser-known areas of Italian goldsmithing art, bronze casts from the High Middle Ages and selected works from the late Gothic period.

Redesign of the Medieval Hall

During the temporary exhibition, the Kunstgewerbemuseum’s Medieval Hall, which has remained largely unchanged since the museum’s opening in 1985, will be entirely redesigned by its completion in 2026. The proposal by the architectural firm of Duncan McCauley, Berlin, which won the redesign competition in 2019, will incorporate the furnishings designed by Rolf Gutbrod for the building and deliberately dispense with space-defining exhibition architecture. The opening is planned for spring 2026. The outstanding collection will then be presented to the public in a contemporary exhibition highlighting the Guelph Treasure as the centrepiece of the entire medieval collection.