Culture

Museum für Moderne Kunst

Contemporary Art in a Spectacular Space
The Museum für Moderne Kunst (MMK, Museum of Modern Art) is the newest addition to Frankfurt am Main's museum scene. Founded in 1981, the museum originated from the art collection of Darmstadt industrialist Karl Ströher. Ten years later the collection moved to a building designed by Hans Hollein, considered to be one of the most spectacular new museum constructions of the 1990s. The museum showcases its permanent collection while continuing to mount important special exhibitions.

An Ongoing Partnership
As a partner of the MMK, we have been participating in an unusual sponsorship model since 2002. According to this model, businesses commit for a period of three years to a contribution of 40,000 euros toward the further development of the museum's collection. The city of Frankfurt am Main provides the MMK with a matching amount. This partnership has already been extended for the third time and will continue to 2010.

Further Information
www.mmk-frankfurt.de

Alte Nationalgalerie Berlin

Die The History of an Important Painting
Caspar David Friedrich's "The Watzmann", painted in 1824/25 in Dresden, is one of the most important landscape paintings of the Romantic period, and became part of the Berlin Nationalgalerie's holdings in 1937. In 2003 it was revealed that the original owner, who was Jewish, had been forced to sell the painting under pressure from the National Socialists. The Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz (Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation), in accordance with its guiding principles, returned the painting to the original owner's heirs.

The "Watzmann" on the Berlin Museumsinsel
In 2004 DekaBank was able to reacquire "The Watzmann", securing for the future its central place in the room dedicated exclusively to the works of Caspar David Friedrich in the Alte Nationalgalerie on Berlin's Museumsinsel (Museum Island). The transfer of the loan took place in a ceremony attended by then German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder.

Further Information
www.smb.spk-berlin.de

Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Unrivaled Variety
The Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (Dresden State Art Collections) rank among the most distinguished museums in the world. A total of eleven museums, the Kunstfonds (Art Fund), the art library, as well as the Lipsius-Bau exhibition building on the Brühlsche Terrasse offer a range of art and art history whose thematic variety is without equal.

Our Support for Dresden
Along with four other Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe (Savings Banks Finance Group) institutions DekaBank has been an "Official Sponsor" of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden since 2006. The goal of the five-year partnership is to preserve the Collections' unique cultural heritage and increase public awareness of its extraordinary importance. In 2006, as part of this partnership, the Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe supported the reopening of Dresden's Historisches Grünes Gewölbe (Historic Green Vault) after sixty years.

Further Information
www.skd-dresden.de

Ruhr. 2010 European Capital of Culture

For the first time an entire region has been named European Capital of Culture. Throughout 2010 the fifty-three cities of the Ruhr, with their wealth of museums, theaters, concert halls, and sites of creativity, will present a varied cultural program comprising 300 projects and 2500 events under the theme “change through culture – culture through change.”

Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe (Savings Banks Financial Group) is a Main Sponsor
Promoting the “raw material” of the future – culture: The Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe, the largest non-governmental sponsor of cultural affairs in Germany, has embraced this cause, and is supporting the European cultural capital RUHR.2010 as both a main sponsor and exclusive project sponsor in the field of photography. As one of the Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe institutions, DekaBank is also a key participant. The Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe’s own exhibition of photography, Ruhrblicke: Ein Fotografieprojekt der Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe (Ruhr Views: A Photography Project of the Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe), augments the cultural program. The exhibition will be on view from April 24 to October 24, 2010 in the SANAA building at the Zollverein world heritage site in Essen, Germany. Eleven prominent German photographers, including Andreas Gursky, Candida Höfer, and Thomas Struth, will present their individual perceptions of today’s Ruhr region in new works done specially for this exhibition. Five of the participating photographers are also represented with works in the DekaBank’s collection of twenty-first-century art.