Kunsthalle Fridericianum

The Fridericianum in Kassel (Hessen) occupies a central role as an exhibition venue for contemporary art and at the same time functions as a building of historical museum significance. It stands on Friedrichsplatz between the former old town and the Oberneustadt.

The building was erected from 1769 to 1779 on the site freed up after the dismantling of the town fortifications and was conceived from the outset for the public display of the landgrave’s art collections and the princely library. During the Kingdom of Westphalia the house served from 1810 to 1813 as a Ständepalast (House of Estates) with a purpose-built assembly hall attached. Thus the Fridericianum ranks among the early European institutions that were intended as museums from the beginning and at the same time housed an early form of a parliamentary assembly venue.

Architecturally the Fridericianum presents a strictly Classicist three-wing layout with an axis oriented toward the centre of the square. The striking main façade features a five-bay central projection with an Ionic columned portico and a triangular pediment bearing the inscription “MVSEVM FRIDERICIANVM”. Two principal storeys, a restrained attic storey and figurative statues on the temple front characterize its appearance. A medieval gate tower was integrated into the complex and received an octagonal superstructure as an observatory. Wartime destruction in the 20th century caused severe damage; the exterior was largely restored, while the interior was reorganized after a fire and extended by a third storey.

Originally the building housed collections of antiquities, natural history objects, cork models of ancient buildings, a weapons and waxworks collection, and a large library that remained here until the Second World War. Parts of the holdings had already been transferred to other Hessian museums at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century; many of the exhibits today belong to Museumslandschaft Hessen Kassel. In 1941 the state library lost almost all of its approximately 350,000 volumes in a bombing raid; rescued items are today preserved, among other places, in the University Library of Kassel.

Since 1955 the Fridericianum has been at the centre of the documenta and serves as the “Kunsthalle Fridericianum” for rotating exhibitions of contemporary art. The programme includes solo exhibitions, retrospectives and large-scale projects often with a socially critical orientation. Additionally, since the 1990s the Kasseler Kunstverein has used ground-floor spaces for the presentation of young contemporary artists.