Collection Photography

The Kunstmuseum Gelsenkirchen already began building the core of its photography collection in the 1950s, long before the medium was established in Europe as an artform in its own right. It started with the Gelsenkirchen photographer Ilse Pässler – in itself also very unusual, given that at that time work by female artists was usually barred from museum collections. Pässler’s oeuvre comprises portraits, shots of her home town Gelsenkirchen in the post-war period and travel photography. In the collection these photographs are complemented by a set of latterly purchased works by the Cologne photographer Chargesheimer who is known for his unembellished images of life and work in the Rhine and Ruhr region. The largest section of the museum’s photographic holdings explores the work of Anton Stankowski who compounds the documentarist approach marked by the two other photographers with a perspective that traces the structures and details of incidental forms of everyday life. It is hard to miss his affinity to the stylistic repertoire of Bauhaus. Comprising just a small number of artists, the photography collection of the Kunstmuseum Gelsenkirchen focuses on the role of the medium in the cultural awakening of the then freshly established Federal Republic. This section of the collection is due to be expanded in the coming future.