Kröller-Müller Museum. Author Artwork by Andrew Lord.  Photography by Marjon Gemmek. Wikimedia Commons

Top 10 Outstanding Facts About Kroller Muller Museum


 

Imagine, you are in a forest. In the middle of this forest, there is a museum with a garden full of sculptures. Both the museum and the garden are filled with the most amazing artistic masterpieces.

Sounds like a dream? It exists. It is the Kröller-Müller Museum in Otterlo, The Netherlands, and it’s located in the middle of the Hoge Veluwe National Park.

The Kröller-Müller Museum (Dutch pronunciation: [ˌkrʏlər ˈmylər myˈzeːjʏm]) is a national art museum and sculpture garden, located in the Hoge Veluwe National Park in Otterlo in the Netherlands.

1. It Was Founded By Helene Kröller-Müller, An Avid Art Collector

Helene Muller. Unknown author. Wikimedia Commons

The Kröller-Müller Museum was founded by Helene Kröller-Müller an avid art collector. She was one of the first to recognize Vincent van Gogh’s genius and collect his works.

In 1935, she donated her whole collection to the state of the Netherlands. In 1938, the museum, which was designed by Henry van de Velde, opened to the public. The sculpture garden was then added in 1961 and the new exhibition wing, designed by Wim Quist, opened in 1977.

2. The Museum Plays Host To Paintings Of One Of The Most Decorated Artists

Vincent van Gogh. Unknown Author  – Wikimedia Commons

Vincent van Gogh is one of the most decorated painters of all time. The museum has a considerable collection of paintings by him, such as Café Terrace at Night, Sorrowing Old Man (At Eternity’s Gate), and a version of The Potato Eaters, making it the second-largest collection of Van Gogh paintings in the world (after the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam).

Apart from the Van Gogh paintings, other highlights include works by Piet Mondrian, Georges-Pierre Seurat, Odilon Redon, Georges Braque, Paul Gauguin, Lucas Cranach, James Ensor, Juan Gris, William Degouve de Nuncques, and Pablo Picasso.

3 It Is Famous For Its Large Sculpture Garden

The Kröller-Müller Museum is also famous for its large sculpture garden. It is located within the forest park and occupies more than 75 acres (30 ha) and is one of the largest in Europe. It has a fine collection of modern and contemporary sculptures.

The garden reflects Helene Kröller-Müller’s conception of a symbiosis between art, architecture, and nature. The collection includes works by Auguste Rodin, Henry Moore, Jean Dubuffet, Mark di Suvero, Lucio Fontana, Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Fritz Wotruba, Joep van Liesh amongst others.

4. Helene Kröller-Müller Attributes The Success To Her Dutch Husband

She was the daughter of a German tycoon and founder of Wm H. Müller & Co, a coal and iron ore company. In 1888, she married Dutchman Anton Kröller, who had started working for her father’s company. When Helene’s father suddenly died, Anton took over the company and helped it flourish even more than before.

Today, a visit to the museum offers a unique opportunity to walk around the nature of the Hoge Veluwe National Park, while exploring iconic sculptural pieces both in the park and inside the museum, alongside galleries filled with 19th and 20th 20th-century famous and lesser-known, but equally strong, artists.

5. The Kröller-Müller Museum Is Unique For  Its Large Van Gogh Collection

The Kröller-Müller Museum is famous for its large Van Gogh collection. His masterpiece “Café Terrace at Night” (1888) hangs in the Van Gogh gallery, alongside many other famous Van Gogh paintings like pieces from the “Potato Eaters” series.

From observation, several works on view show that Van Gogh had a fascinating relationship to light and shadows. These include: is silhouettes of faces in extremely dark settings.

You can barely make out the faces due to the dark shadows, and this is exactly what makes the paintings so interesting. His “Lane of Poplars at Sunset” (1884) is another Van Gogh piece that is more subtle than his famous paintings, but all the more powerful for it. A solitary figure walks between rows of poplar trees towards the sunset. This is a painting that won’t let you go.

6. A Temporary Exhibition Was Held In 2020

A temporary exhibition was held in 2020. It featured a selection of rare works on paper, sketches, pastels, watercolors, and paintings, from the collection of Helene Kröller-Müller. The exhibition focused on street scenes, city scenes, and scenes of nightlife from the 19th and 20thcenturiesy, creating a deep picture of times long gone.

The exhibition leaves you with an almost physical experience that can only be described as a deep desire for times passed, for explorations at night, for a life lived that is far from perfect, but above all, bold and passionate.

7. The Museum Is An Excellent Representation Of Europe’s Contemporary Art

The Kröller-Müller Museum is an excellent representation of Europe’s contemporary art of the 19th and 20th centuries. Impressionism, symbolism, and cubism are represented by artists.  A “temporary” building was built in 1935 by the government, clean-lined, sober, and undoubtedly closer to Helene’s stated ideal of “serene silence” than any of her castles in the air. Its construction was a public-works project for the unemployed, who erected the single-story pavilion in just 14 months.

Helene inaugurated the building–still in use today–and became the museum’s first director. Eighteen months later, she died at the age of 70.

8. The Kröller-Müller Foundation Was Established To Protect Helene’s Collections

To protect her collection, Helene transferred all the art to a Foundation. The government financed the construction of the ‘grand museum’ while, the Kröller-Müller Foundation donated her collection to the State.

 The goal of the foundation is ‘The creation and maintenance of a monument, which gives an idea of the spiritual direction of the present time, to the benefit and enjoyment of the community.

9. One New Sculpture Is Commissioned Every Year

 The Kröller-Müller commissions one new sculpture every year, on average, although now it is hard-pressed to maintain that pace: The Dutch government has cut back on funding and corporate sponsors are loath to drop money into such an obscure corner of Holland.

10. The Museum Was Designed By Henry van de Velde

Picture of a Sculptor. Photo by Kayla Koss on Unsplash

The design was by Belgian architect Henry van de Velde, who is considered to be one of the main founders and representatives of Art Nouveau in Belgium. Van de Velde spent the most important part of his career in Germany and had a decisive influence on German architecture and design at the beginning of the 20th century.