"AutoWerke" - The Major Photo Collection of BMW Group Financial Services is being donated to the Fine Arts Museum in Leipzig

Munich / Leipzig. In the presence of Leipzig's Mayor, Wolfgang
Tiefensee, the donation presentation to the Museum Director Dr.
Hans-Werner Schmidt by a member of the BMW AG Board of Management
Stefan Krause is being held on 28 April 2005 from 10.00 a.m. in the
Leipzig Fine Arts Museum. "AutoWerke" features the works of
Thomas Demand, Candida Höfer, Wolfgang Tillmans, Thomas Struth,
Sharon Lockhart, Rineke Dijkstra and many others. Initiated in 1997 as
a project assignment of BMW Group Financial Services Germany and BMW
Group Financial Services North America, the "Autowerke" photo
collection features a valuable collection of European and American
photographic works, which were created between 1998 and 2000 by 28
internationally renown artists, including Thomas Demand, Candida
Höfer, Wolfgang Tillmans, Thomas Struth, Sharon Lockhart and
Rineke Dijkstra. All works are single works of art - not produced in
an edition. With 75 photographic and video works the artists expressed
their own individual view of the theme of automobiles and mobility.
Right from the creation of the collection, the freedom of content of
all works and the artistic creation process was paramount. For two
years, the participating artists were able to work internationally:
Across the world all company production sites were opened in order to
give the artists insights into corporate philosophy, myths and the
reality of an automobile brand. From plant facilities to staff
apartments and production processes - everything was recorded on
camera. One of the BMW Group's essential principles in all their
cultural projects is content-related and formal freedom as well as
independence of artistic development. Neither the choice of motif nor
the presentation medium were predefined. Each artist should be
permitted to freely pursue his or her own aesthetic and content-related
approaches. "AutoWerke" thus combines a wide range of
artists' views and production methods. The uniqueness of the collection
is not only attributable to the different choices of motifs, but also
to the various technical forms of presentation, which ranged from black
and white or colour photography to photo montage and video engineering.
Individual works, sequences and series thus offer an extensive synopsis
of items of contemporary photographic and video art. Following the
exhibitions' roaring success with the Press and the public in the
Hamburg Deichtorhallen in 2000/2001 and in the Frans-Hals-Museum in
Haarlem 2001, the idea was born to make the collection permanently
accessible to the public so that the company-owned works of
ground-breaking artists could not just be enjoyed by staff and guests.
The collection will thus be presented to the newly opened Fine Arts
Museum in Leipzig in December 2004. All "AutoWerke" works
will be presented in a large exhibition in Leipzig. From 19 June to 21
August the Fine Arts Museum will be presenting the entire collection in
its own exhibition before selected works are permanently hung in
prominent positions in the Museum. And now there is nothing more to stop
the works being exchanged and presented in other museums worldwide.
Opinions on the "AutoWerke" donation. Wolfgang Tiefensee,
Mayor of the City of Leipzig on the significance of the donation of
"Autowerke" for the Saxon metropolis: "With 'Autowerke'
our Fine Arts Museum is being given a high-quality photograph
collection which has dealt with the theme of mobility in an artistically
unusual manner. The donation of the BMW Group with an estimated value of
1.5 million euros is an enormous enrichment for our museum's
photographic collection. I would like to express my utmost gratitude
and am particularly pleased because this is a great contribution to
Leipzig's grand photographic tradition. In Leipzig entrepreneurs have
always done a great deal for culture. I am very happy that the BMW
Group is not just doing a lot for Leipzig as an economic location, but
is also promoting Leipzig as an art location." Dr. Hans-Werner
Schmidt, Director of the Fine Arts Museum in Leipzig on the donation of
the "Autowerke" collection to his institution:
"Acceleration has disappeared from car advertising headlines. On
the other hand, we can say that with the donation of 'AutoWerke' by BMW
Financial Services we can now immediately offer a new collection focus,
which could otherwise only have been compiled over a long period of
time - a long-lasting acceleration." Stefan Krause, Member of the
BMW AG Board of Directors, comments on the "Autowerke"
donation from the company's viewpoint: "When the BMW Group
commissioned mostly young and international photographers at the end of
the 1990s to create works on the theme of mobility, no one could
foresee that the careers of many of the participating artists would take
off like a shooting star. Many of them are meanwhile acknowledged with
major exhibitions across the world. The BMW Group is extremely pleased
to be able to donate the entire 'Autowerke' collection to the Fine Arts
Museum in our plant location Leipzig. This important new museum is just
the right institution to be permanently entrusted with the exhibition,
the lending and the care of these unique exhibits." List of all
participating artists for the "AutoWerke" collection.
Baranowsky Heike Demand Thomas Dijkstra Rineke Eberle Todd Fischer Nina
& el Sani Maroan Hirakawa Noritoshi Höfer Candida Hunter Tom
Jones Sarah Lamsweerde van Inez & Matadin Vinoodh Ligon Glenn
Lockhart Sharon Michailov Boris Muggenthaler Johannes Opie Catherine
Rickett Sophy Rogg Ursula Seawright Paul Shrigley David Smith Bridget
Starkey Hannah Streuli Beat Struth Thomas Tillmans Wolfgang Timtschenko
Alexander (in cooperation with Morävek Jakub) Wearing Gillian
High-resolution images of the works of the following artists can be
downloaded from: www.press.bmwgroup.com: Tillmanns, Höfer, Struth,
Dijkstra and Lockhart. In the "Photo" section click on the
link "Engagement/Sports/Lifestyle" to access the link
"Culture and Art". Further information available from:
Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig Katharinenstraße 10 04109
Leipzig Phone: +49 341 216 99 914 Fax: +49 341 216 99 999 Mail:
mdbk@leipzig.de www.mdbk.de Should you have any queries, please
contact: Corporate Communications Thomas Girst, Public Relations, Head
of Cultural Communications Telephone: +49 89 382 24753, Fax: +49 89 382
28017 Michael Kirsch, Head of Public Relations Telefon: +49 89 382
25111, Fax: +49 89 382 28017 Internet: www.press.bmwgroup.com,
www.bmwgroup.com/culture e-mail: presse@bmw.de