Kunsthalle Bern

The Kunsthalle Bern is a Kunsthalle (art exposition hall) on the Helvetiaplatz in Bern, Switzerland.

It was built in 1917–1918 by the Kunsthalle Bern Association and opened on October 5, 1918. Since then, it has been the site of numerous exhibitions of contemporary art. The Kunsthalle gained international acclaim with solo exhibitions by artists such as On Kawara, Paul Klee, Christo, Alberto Giacometti, Henry Moore, Jasper Johns, Sol LeWitt, Gregor Schneider, Eva Aeppli, Bruce Nauman, Lawrence Weiner, Bridget Riley and Daniel Buren, Hans Haacke and has hosted seminal group exhibitions such as Harald Szeemann's Live In Your Head: When Attitudes Become Form (1969). Szeeman's work for the institution was re-visited in recent years by various exhibitions that took place in Fondazione Prada and Kunsthalle Bern, among other places, such as Impossible Encounters, according to the Financial Times.

The institution boasts more than a century of ground-breaking exhibition-making and is considered an important source for the study of twentieth-century exhibition history.

On the occasion of its 50th anniversary the Kunsthalle Bern became the first building ever to be wrapped entirely by Christo and Jeanne-Claude in July 1968.

Directors

 * 1918 – 1930: Robert Kieser
 * 1931 – 1946: Max Huggler
 * 1946 – 1955: Arnold Rüdlinger
 * 1955 – 1961: Franz Meyer
 * 1961 – 1969: Harald Szeemann
 * 1970 – 1974: Carlo Huber
 * 1974 – 1982: Johannes Gachnang
 * 1982 – 1985: Jean-Hubert Martin
 * 1985 – 1997: Ulrich Loock
 * 1997 – 2005: Bernhard Fibicher
 * 2005 – 2011: Philippe Pirotte
 * 2012 – 2014: Fabrice Stroun
 * 2015 – 2022: Valérie Knoll
 * 2022 - 2024: Kabelo Malatsie
 * 2024 : iLiana Fokianaki

Literature

 * Jean-Christophe Ammann / Harald Szeemann, Von Hodler zur Antiform. Geschichte der Kunsthalle Bern, Bern 1970.
 * Hans Rudolf Reust, Aus dem Musée éclaté an den Ort des Werks, Kunsthalle Bern 1969-1993, Bern 1993, ISBN 3-85780-088-7
 * Florian Dombois, Valerie Knoll, eds, im Tun: Eine Geschichte der Künstler*innen 2018–1993. Kunsthalle Bern, 100 Jahre, Bern 2018
 * Peter Schneemann, Localizing the Contemporary – The Kunsthalle Bern as a Model, JRP Ringier Editions, 2018 ISBN 978-3037645284