4. Floor 1997-1998: A.R.Penck, Standart Modell, 1968; Jean-Michel Basquiat, Levétation, 1987; Jean-Michel Basquiat, Untitled, 1987; Frank Stella, Of Whales, in paint, in teeth…, 1990
History
Rolf and Erika Hoffmann made their first discoveries in contemporary art in the sixties at the early Documentas in Kassel, and in exhibitions at the museums, exhibition spaces and Kunstvereine of Germany’s Rhineland region. They were challenged by discussions with artists about their new ideas, and the works that incorporated them, in their personal lives, but they also found creative inspiration for their professional lives.
In order to maintain this direct access to the ideas and discourses of the art scene despite the demands of raising a family and running their own company, “van Laack,” they decided, in the late sixties, to start buying art, which they did sporadically at first. The works they chose were by as yet unestablished artists whom they knew personally and with whom they associated certain concepts. At the time the idea—let alone the goal—of establishing a vast collection of contemporary art had not crossed their minds.
The great variety of artistic expression excited Rolf and Erika Hoffmann and was at the same time, in their eyes, the essential characteristic of contemporary art. They sought out innovation regardless of medium. Wherever their (mostly business) travels took them, it was contemporary art that provided them an outlet for engaging the pressing questions facing society.
With the sale of their company in 1985, Rolf and Erika Hoffmann were able to dedicate more time and financial freedom to their passion—time to see more new work as well as to delve more deeply into their acquisitions; financial freedom to invest in additional new purchases. Still, the Hoffmanns continued to think of their collecting as purely private, a pursuit of their own personal taste and interests that was, accordingly, anonymous.
That changed with the fall of the Berlin Wall, when the Hoffmanns wanted to participate actively in the societal and cultural changes that came with the reunification of Germany. They developed the idea of a public art gallery (Kunsthalle) for Dresden as a private-public partnership. The American artist Frank Stella came up with a daring conceptual plan for it. The Hoffmanns—as the initiators of the project, which in the long term was meant to be financially self-supporting—sought powerful investors as well as additional collectors to serve as lenders for a program of temporary exhibitions. When the project failed to get off the ground, they began to think about starting a fully private and thus independent project.
They settled on a new and different idea that would allow them to live with the artworks they’d acquired, in generously proportioned quarters, while also making their personal experiences accessible, at certain times, to others. In 1994 they found a former sewing-machine factory that they were able to renovate and repurpose. They and their tenants moved into the building’s large lofts in 1997. Since then it has been possible to see the Hoffmann’s living and work spaces—now designated SAMMLUNG HOFFMANN [The Hoffmann Collection].
Since the death of her husband in 2001, Erika Hoffmann has continued on her own the work they once did together, constantly adding to the collection.