The exhibition ‘Emil Schumacher and the Design of his Times‘ represents international design across the entire 20th century with outstanding examples by Asnago & Vender, Peter Behrens, Mario Botta, Marcel Breuer, Franco Campo, Carlo Graffi, Josef Hoffmann, Arne Jacobsen, Ferdinand Kramer, Angelo Lelli, Adolf Loos, Michele de Lucchi, Vico Magistretti, Enzo Mari, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Gino Levi-Montalcini, Bruno Munari, Giuseppe Pagano Pogatschnig, Verner Panton, Hans de Pelsmacker, Richard Sapper, Gino Sarfatti, Ettore Sottsass, Dante dela Torre, Wilhelm Wagenfeld, Marcel Wanders, Tokujin Yoshioka and many others.

Away from omnipresent classics such as Ray and Charles Eames’ ‘Lounge Chair’ and Le Corbusier’s iconic recliner, this exhibition lets painting and sculpture resonate with design to offer a new perspective. The many mid-century modernist design objects preserved in the artist’s residence in Hagen provided the original inspiration for the concept behind this exhibition. As a painter, Emil Schumacher was particularly interested in all kinds of shapes, which time and again captivated his attention. He was just as likely to spot them in pieces of driftwood on the beaches of Ibiza as in potato haulms left on a field near Hagen after the harvest. Naturally, his artist’s gaze was also reflected in his own home and its immediate, private surroundings, which he created for himself together with his wife Ulla. During the time of the first big successes at the beginning of the 1950s, Schumacher was already purchasing furniture for his own domestic interior, furniture whose clear-cut forms even then made a splash as the ‘Danish Design’ sensation. He discovered these pieces at art exhibitions such as ‘Mensch und Form unserer Zeit’ (Man and Form in Our Times) at Kunsthalle Recklinghausen in 1952, which he himself was involved in as a painter. Only a few years later, Schumacher – through numerous exhibitions – also had intensive contact with Italian art dealers and collectors in whose homes he encountered contemporary
Italian design. Also, Italian architecture magazines, such as the 1950s ‘Domus’ founded by Gio Ponti, can be found in the artist‘s library, and are evidence of his interest in the free-spirited, playful visual language of Italy.

This exhibition was created in collaboration with Sebastian Jacobi from Bad Ems, one of the preeminent design historians and collectors in Germany today. Loans from his collection – never before presented in a museum context – are juxtaposed with paintings and sculptures as well as applied art exhibits from Hagen’s museums. The tour begins with a bell plaque by Peter Behrens that symbolises the ‘Hagen Impulse’ art movement led by Karl Ernst Osthaus at the start of the 20th century, and continues through to century’s end, here represented by Marcel Wanders’ ‘Knotted Chair’