Which Modernism? In- and outsiders of the avant-garde

The exhibition traces the interconnections between so-called naïve artists and the "masters" of classical modernism. The term "naïve" or "painter of the sacred heart" was coined by the Paris-based art historian Wilhelm Uhde, who wanted to draw attention to a selection of special talents, including Henri Rousseau as a model, Séraphine Louis, André Bauchant, Camille Bombois, Louis Vivin, Adolph Dietrich, Maurice Utrillo and many more. Their lives did not correspond to the usual biographies of trained artists. Henri Rousseau was a tax collector, Séraphine Louis was a shepherdess and cleaning woman. Adalbert Trillhaase was a merchant and only began painting at an advanced age. The "Naives" only became known at the end of the 1930s through a travelling exhibition in France, which is the starting point of our exhibition project. They will be shown for the first time in dialogue with works by renowned artists such as Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger, Otto Dix, Max Ernst, Marc Chagall and Paula Modersohn-Becker. On the basis of a selection of almost 100 works, the exhibition offers a new reading in the development of modern art that understands supposed outsiders as a self-evident part of classical modernism and thus makes a contribution to the discussion of canon formation in modernism.
The exhibition takes place in cooperation with the Sprengel Museum Hannover.
Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz - Museum Gunzenhauser