Why this is the year to visit Switzerland’s top art museum
<p><em>The Fondation Beyeler, Switzerland’s top modern art museum located in Basel, is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year with three special exhibitions. Image credit: Justine Tyerman</em></p>
<p><em><strong>Justine Tyerman is a New Zealand journalist, travel writer and sub-editor. Married for 36 years, she lives in rural surroundings near Gisborne on the East Coast of New Zealand with her husband Chris. In this piece, she write about Switzerland’s top art museum, which is celebrating 20 years with exclusive Claude Monet, Wolfgang Tillmans and Paul Klee exhibition.</strong></em></p>
<p>The Fondation Beyeler, Switzerland’s top modern art museum located in Basel, is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year with three special exhibitions featuring impressionism by Claude Monet, photography by Wolfgang Tillmans and abstract art by Paul Klee, as well as free entry for visitors under the age of 25.</p>
<p>From 22 January – 28 May 2017, fifty Monet masterpieces from private collections and renowned museums including the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the Pola Museum in Japan, the Metropolitan Museum in New York, and the Art Institute in Chicago will be on display. A celebration of light and color illustrating the artistic development of the great French painter from Impressionism to his famous late work, the exhibition will feature his Mediterranean landscapes, wild Atlantic coastal scenes, different stretches of the Seine, meadows with wild flowers, haystacks, water lilies, cathedrals, and bridges shrouded in fog.</p>
<p>Then, from 28 May – 1 October 2017, Fondation Beyeler’s first comprehensive engagement with photography will see a presentation of Wolfgang Tillmans studio pictures, still life’s and portraits, all of which captured the attitude of an entire modern generation and the youth culture from the early 1900s to the present day. The exhibition will centre on Tillman’s studio as a working space in which his photographs are tested and produced for the first time, as well as the studio as social place, where he spends much of his life.</p>
<p><em><img width="497" height="370" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/34670/in-text-image_497x370.jpg" alt="In -text -image (1)"/></em></p>
<p><em>Fifty Monet masterpieces from private collections and renowned museums including the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the Pola Museum in Japan, the Metropolitan Museum in New York, and the Art Institute in Chicago will be on display until 28 May 2017. Image credit: Justine Tyerman</em></p>
<p>Finally, from 1 October 2017 – 21 January 2018, about 100 pieces of Paul Klee’s work dating from 1913 including some of his rarely exhibited works, will be on display. The pieces, on valuable loans from numerous renowned institutions and private collections in Europe and overseas will represent Paul Klee’s contribution during the time of move away from figurativeness and the development of abstract art in Europe. Visitors and art aficionados will appreciate the key aspects of Klee’s abstract works that have been a central strand of his entire oeuvre: nature, architecture, music and written characters.</p>
<p>Apart from the special exhibitions, there will also be three presentations of the permanent collection, where visitors will be able to learn about the museum founder Ernst Beyeler and his collection, the relationship between artists and the collection, and the dialog between collectors and the collection.</p>
<p>Attracting tens of thousands of visitors each year from all over the world, the Fondation Beyeler will aims to encourage more young people to learn about modern art.</p>
<p>Visit <a href="https://www.fondationbeyeler.ch/" target="_blank"><strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">www.fondationbeyeler.ch</span></strong></a> for more information and tickets.</p>
<p>For more information on Switzerland’s art museums, visit <strong><a href="http://www.myswitzerland.com/en-au/suggestions/art-museums-of-switzerland.html" target="_blank"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">www.myswitzerland.com/art-museums-of-switzerland</span></a></strong>.</p>
<p>Have you ever been to Switzerland? Share your travel advice in the comments below.</p>
