© Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt Am Main

The Museum für Moderne Kunst (MMK) is located in the center of Frankfurt, on a walking distance of the old market place. The building is rather anonymous from the outside.

Nobuyoshi Araki, Color Sensuous Diary, 2010 / Photo: Filip De Haes

The central place on the main floor was dominated by a big wall with explicit Asian pictures of Nobuyoshi Araki. Behind the wall is a room with more ‘bondage style’ images and displayed books of Araki. The controversial images of Araki are alternated with very serene portraits by Thomas Ruff. More explicit pictures by Dino Pedriali… and a neonlight poem by Cerith Wyn Evans. (The Araki photo wall is currently not shown, as the museum changed the exhibit.)

VG-Bildkunst, Joseph Beuys, Blitzschlag mit Lichtschein auf Hirsch, 1958-1985 / Photo: Filip De Haes

Artworks of the main exhibition are mixed with some fixed pieces of the main collection. The giant hanging compass ‘Blitzschlag mit Lichtschein auf Hirsch (1958-1985)’ of Joseph Beuys, around which the museum was actually built, is one of them. The friendly guard pointed me to a five page booklet that should explain this ‘superb work’…

Bettina Rheims, Pourquoi m’as-tu abandonnée, 1994 / Photo: Filip De Haes

The photography of the temporary exhibition ‘The Lucid Evidence’ had some remarkable works shown. On the first floor I prefered the often kinky pictures of posing women by Bettina Rheims, and the image shot in Odradek by Jeff Wall. (Unfortunately the Bettina Rheims work is not shown anymore.)

Taryn Simon, Playboy, Braille Edition, 2003-2007 / Photo: Filip De Haes

On the second floor, I liked the photos of the series ‘An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar’ by Taryn Simon, as they were quite remarkable without having to be brutal or vulgar.

A temporary Exhibition, The Lucid Evidence – Works from the Photography Collection of the MMK is currently exhibited from September 25, 2010 until April 25, 2011.

MMK Museum für Moderne Kunst
Opening hours: 10:00 – 18:00 (Wednesday until 20:00)
Closed on Monday
Address: Domstraße 10, 60311 Frankfurt
Tel: +49 (0)69 2123 0447
https://www.mmk-frankfurt.de