Wiesbaden: No sculpture at the Congress Center

• fromMadeleine Reckmann

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A staircase sculpture by the artist Monica Bonvicini should not be erected in Wiesbaden after all – for insurance reasons, as they say. The cultural advisory board speaks of a “disgrace”.

Initially, the former museum director Alexander Klar had accused the city administration of thwarting the installation of the work of art at the Rhein-Main-Congresscenter RMCC. Then the cultural advisory board campaigned that the project would not be crushed. Now the artist Monica Bonvicini is surprisingly withdrawing and does not want her sculpture made of stairs to be erected, for insurance reasons, as the city announces. The place in front of the RMCC will probably not be adorned with a work of art as soon as it is finished.

In 2017 the internationally known Berlin artist won the “Art in Architecture” competition for the new building of the RMCC. Her four-meter-high sculpture made of irregular steps should help to gain space in front of the exhibition stand. Children should be able to climb on the work of art and people should be able to sit on the steps. But the jury’s choice did not seem to please those responsible. The then head of the Department of Economic Affairs declared the plant not suitable for approval due to its size. The news that the jury had selected her was not even delivered to Bonvicini at the time. And now, according to the city, the conditions of the insurance are the reason for the failure. The cultural advisory board does not want to accept this. He asks for another exam.

The advisory board announced that this was a “disgrace for Wiesbaden”. “After it is not the first time that art is treated like an unpleasant child in public space and, at best, talked to death, we are once again very provincial as a city,” comments Dorothea Angor, deputy chairwoman of the cultural council. The advisory board had discussed the importance of art in architecture for publicly funded building projects. “This is not about advertising a building project, but about revitalizing public spaces and squares through art, which is highly relevant for the cities,” says Chairman of the Cultural Advisory Board Ernst Szebedits.

The public discussion about her design in recent years made the planning phase difficult, writes the city in view of the artist’s rejection. Bonvicini had made many compromises and, among other things, accepted a new location. When the state capital’s liability insurer recently equated the insurance conditions for the sculpture with those for playgrounds, she was convinced that the project could not be implemented.

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