912 – Mission Moderne: Die Jahrhundertschau des Sonderbundes

Almost 100 years ago Cologne was host to what clearly was the single most important presentation of European Modernism ever. Entitled the “Sonderbund Exhibition”, the show in summer 1912 charted the developments of the latest movements in painting and the sculpture by means of 577 canvases and 57 sculptures by 173 artists.

This unique exhibition brought together an abundance of masters that would be quite inconceivable today, including Cézanne, Gauguin, Macke, Munch, Nolde, Picasso, Schiele, Signac and van Gogh. With “1912 – Mission Moderne“, the Wallraf celebrates the centenary of the original exhibition by taking a spectacular look back at the Sonderbund’s show with over 100 masterpieces that were all exhibited at that time. Thanks to the historical distance afforded by the hundred years in between, this fascinating retrospective underscores just how revolutionary and trail-blazing the “Sonderbund Exhibition” was in its time.