Since its opening, each autumn la maison rouge has shown a major international collection. Beginning October 17th, 2015, Artur Walther’s exceptional collection of photography will be on view. Over a period of twenty years, Artur Walther has assembled significant and cohesive ensembles, beginning with German photography, then American, and later African and Asian photography.

Après Eden will present a selection of over 500 works by some fifty artists. Historical photography, daguerreotypes, contemporary photography, video works, journals and late nineteenthcentury albums have been chosen by the curator, Simon Njami, to form an itinerary which takes in landscapes, faces, performance, portraiture, and anthropometric and ethnographic essays.

Artur Walther was born in Ulm, Germany. He lives and works in New York.

A former investment banker, he opened his collection to the public in 2010 with the inauguration of a four-building museum complex in a residential area of Neu-Ulm / Berlafingen, the town where he was born in southern Germany. He has supported photographic programmes and grants for the past twenty years. Artur Walther began collecting in the late 1990s: first works by contemporary German photographers – particularly Bernd and Hilla Becher, and August Sander – before opening his collection to photography and video art from around the globe. His is now the largest collection of contemporary Asian and African photography in the world.

Curator: Simon Njami.