Brusberg Berlin

Information letter
for the friends of Brusberg Berlin,
October 2010
Victor Brauner
»Machine surréaliste«
Photo collage, 1937
14,5 x 20,6 cm
Hofgalerie
Kurfürstendamm 213
D-10719 Berlin
Postal address:
Lyckallee 14
D-14055 Berlin
Telephone +49 (0)30 882 76 82
Fax +49 (0)30 881 53 89
galerie@brusberg-berlin.de
www.brusberg-berlin.de
Art Dealing and Concepts
Brusberg Berlin
Kunsthandel und Konzepte
Ernst Wilhelm Nay
»Fisch und Muschel«
Oil on canvas, 1932
59,5 x 47,5 cm
Franz Roh
»Der Fisch verstummt
am Altar der Gewalt«
Collage, 1934
21,5 x 16 auf 23,5 x 17 cm
You will remember: in my letter of 22 June, my 75th birthday, I announced a farewell and
new beginning "at the latest in May of the coming year, maybe in April." But then the train
picked up speed. My new partners, close friends, could not wait; they wanted to show their
colours and take on responsibility at the beginning of the year. Now all the formalities are
taken care of, and the contracts are signed. Sadness? No: eager anticipation of the adventure
of farewell and new beginnings.
"Rosendahl, Thöne & Westphal - Galerie und Kunsthandel"
Three names, one goal. The people with one passion: art. The new owners know that art
needs above all love and connoisseurship, but also economic expertise. There is no dearth
of that. Petra Thöne and Udo Rosendahl are experienced and successful businesspeople.
I met them almost nine years ago, as collectors. Today, they are roughly as old as I was
when I opened my Berlin gallery on Kurfürstendamm 213 in 1982. Which to this day is
one of the top addresses for people with a passion for art that addresses essential questions.
Petra Thöne runs two pharmacies; Udo Rosendahl works in the international finance business.
Both are rooted in an enchanting city in Westphalia, Warburg. They came to me in
Berlin seeking advice. About Gerhard Altenbourg - by no means a zeitgeisty artist. But
an artist who deals with essential things. Lots of elective affinities. No wonder then that
Petra Thöne and Udo Rosendahl found an open door and got critical advice from me.
Their Altenbourg collection grew into one of the most beautiful ones in the land. Anybody
can see it - over the hills and far away, that is to say: in Warburg.
But believing that these collectors concentrate on cabinet-sized art means discounting their
baroque attitude to life, the pleasure they also take in large formats. Impressive groups of
works by John Meyer (1942, Bloemfontein, South Africa), the painter of people, as well
as by Vincent Wenzel (1979, Berlin) may serve as markers for the wide range of their interests.
And such apparently different sculptors as the South African Dylan Lewis (1964,
Johannesburg) and Rolf Szymanski (1928), the Berliner from Leipzig, stand for a happy
symbiosis of connoisseurship and daring. This will also inform the profile of their gallery.
In harmony with Stefan Westphal, who completes the trio.

Ernst Wilhelm Nay
»Fischer«
Oil on canvas, 1936
105,5 x 135,3 cm
Vincent Wenzel
»Eskapade« II
Oil on canvas, 2010
113 x 92 cm
Until 6 November 2010
»Figur Traum Zeichen«
E.W. Nay, Hans (Jean) Arp,
Willi Baumeister, Hans Bellmer,
Victor Brauner, Salvador Dalí,
Max Ernst, Henri Laurens,
Francis Picabia,
Anton Räderscheidt,
Franz Roh, Louis Soutter,
Hans Uhlmann
From mid-November
until the end of December 2010
Vincent Wenzel
»Brot und Spiele«
new paintings
The exhibition will
be accompanied
by the Kabinettdruck 43
with texts by Veit Stiller,
Martin Schneider,
and Vincent Wenzel
A trio, then. Petra Thöne will devote herself to the business aspects from Warburg;
Udo Rosendahl will open doors for the young gallery during his trips around the
globe, but will also avail himself of my old connections. In Berlin, Stefan Westphal
- together with Ruth Neitemeier - will make sure that the Hofgalerie [gallery in the
courtyard] will remain a vibrant place for art under the new leadership. Stefan
Westphal has been associated with the gallery for 17 years; he was something like
a protégé, almost a son to me. And Ruth Neitemeier has been part of the operation
for more than twenty years now, knowledgeable and caring, always well informed,
always perfectly organised. In this way, things can and will continue.
For six years, I was looking for the one successor. Now it has become a team, and
that is good thing. Partners who remain independent and see themselves as collaborators,
both intellectually and also in practical terms. The young gallery will have
access to my (still rather large) inventory, thus being able to offer a wide range of
works from the start, and it can use its capital for its own purchases to which I in
turn will have access. I will stay close by, as a dealer and advisor, based on
Lyckallee.
The attractive 300-square-meter Schaulager (storage depot available for viewing)
on Fürstenplatz will be used by both parties. The costs are shared, and what's on
offer will be enriched. Splendid prospects. Also for the gallery's friends. And therefore,
please mark the date: on 14 January 2011, Rosendahl, Thöne & Westphal will
open the new gallery with a show significantly entitled "Szenenwechsel" [Scene
Change]. A new departure, in a new year.
As far as I am concerned, I now need to find closure, and once again make a mark.
Thus it is wonderful that four paintings by the great Ernst Wilhelm Nay, which had
been believed lost, play a major role in the eighth staging of the "Bildertheater",
which was invented for the intimate courtyard gallery. They were painted in the
1930s; hovering searchingly, but already with great mastery, between surrealism,
Neue Sachlichkeit, and an expressive gesture, on the path to the non-figurative:
anticipations of his grandiose late works, including traces of struggle and development.
The paintings, sculptures, collages, and drawings by colleagues and contemporaries
shown with the Nays reveal surprising elective affinities. Seen together,
they manifest the struggle for symbiosis of form and meaning - and they show that
beauty and horror, hope and far, love and death are inseparable.
On view until 6 November. About 10 days later, Vincent Wenzel will herald my
farewell with his second solo show in the Hofgalerie. His exhibition is called "Brot
und Spiele" [Bread and Circuses], taken from the title of one of his paintings - this
could well have served as a metaphor for the 52 years of pleasure and burden that
were my work as a gallerist. But the pleasure was always the dominant element that
kept me going. And that will remain the same. We will keep in touch.
Until then, Yours truly Dieter Brusberg