Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen will be completely finished, fitted out and functioning in the fall of 2021. But we didn’t want the people to wait that long, so we gave them the opportunity to view the empty building from the inside. People could visit the Depot and the roof terrace during three days in the last weekend of September 2020.
More than 7,000 tickets were given out in three hours. We would have liked to receive many more people, but due to the coronavirus and the 1,5 meters distancing, this was really the maximum number of allowed visitors. That is why an online program has been put together. On this page you will find existing and recent video material, beautiful images from Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen. Via the Boijmans Facebook page you can watch a Boijmans Live with Fokke Moerel, architect MVRDV, and Boijmans director Ina Klaassen.
Welcome! For three days, the simsalabim doors of Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen opened during the Silver Opening. Management Boijmans Van Beuningen Ina Klaassen and Sjarel Ex, architect Winy Maas and Director of the De Verre Bergen Foundation Roelof Prins would like to welcome you through the videos below.
View the timelapse of the construction of Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen: March 2017 - July 2020. The timelapse was made with a camera that was positioned on the tower of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen.
Bag designer Susan Bijl has conquered Rotterdam. Inspired by the depot, she made a special edition bag, of course in mirrored silver. The bag was sold out in no time, but a restock will be available from June 2021.
Sonia Herman Dolz is a Dutch filmmaker, screenwriter and documentary maker. She previously made the documentary 'Conducting Boijmans', about director Sjarel Ex. She also closely followed the construction of Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen. Videos are shown below of three important moments in the construction of the depot (reaching the highest point, mounting the mirror panels on the facade and the Silver Opening)
In ten cinematic portraits, fifteen people reflect on the depot while the depot also reflects them. The people portrayed talk about their interpretation of the new icon, which makes the building come to life more and more. Because this reflective building never has a face, we look at the depot through the eyes of others. Zahra Reijs (1992, documentary maker/portrait photographer from Rotterdam) directed these glances.
In nine episodes, Wout Braber, head of Housing and Maintenance at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, takes you through the depot. In this way you climb together with Wout from the entrance to the sixth floor. In each video a floor is viewed and discussed, so you can see what it looks like now, but also what this floor will look like in the future.
On Thursday 7 May, the new Boijmans Van Beuningen Depot was the focus of the last edition of Boijmans in Donner. Due to COVID-19, this episode could not take place live with an audience in Bookshop Donner, but could be seen via a live stream on the Boijmans Facebook page.
Architect Arjen Ketting, responsible at MVRDV for the depot, talks about the special design and explains the design process and the challenges. Sandra Kisters, Head of Collection and Research at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, talks about the layout of the depot and takes you through the monster operation of the relocation of the collection, which consists of more than 151,000 objects.
View the presentation here:
Gers! #28 was launched on the roof of Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen. Gers! is the most Rotterdam magazine in the city. To commemorate the Silver Opening of the new icon for Rotterdam, Gers #28 is all about the depot.
For once not a person on the cover but a building. And if you look closely, you can see yourself on the cover. The first copy was presented by editor-in-chief Sander Grip to Ina Klaassen (director Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen) and Said Kasmi (alderman for Education, Culture and Tourism).
Gers! #28 was available at various locations in Rotterdam, and can also be read digitally.
Read Gers! Magazine #28 (in Dutch)The museum has three basic tasks, namely displaying the collection in an art-historical context, researching and preserving the collection. The museum is the showroom, the depot is the engine room. Here the public can watch museum activities such as the packaging of works of art for loan, conservation and restoration. The dynamics in the depot will be different from those in the museum: exhibitions are made in the museum, in the depot you can browse among more than 151,000 art objects with a guide or independently. It is also possible to watch along with, for example, conservation and restoration.
At the beginning of 2018, the first edition of the Depot Journal was published: a series of glossy magazines with which we inform, enthuse, and stimulate a large group of interested parties during the period of the construction of the depot. We talked about the wish to make our artworks accessible, the iconic design of MVRDV and the technical challenges we face. But we also told about the staggering amount of works that will soon be on display in the depot (151,000 pieces!). And what unique opportunities the depot offers, not only for the museum and for collectors, but especially for our visitors.
