Neues Museum Berlin

This reprint of the original 2009 edition, edited by David Chipperfield, documents his most important project to date: the Neues Museum, the centrepiece of the Berlin Museumsinsel. Here he connects the old and the new in a completely novel way. As he says himself, he “proceeded like a painter, who painstakingly considers every dab of paint”. Photographs by Candida Höfer show the rooms after their completion and before they were furnished. As Höfer avoided using artificial light, the rooms are bathed in a soft natural light. These critical moments are perfectly reproduced in the book as matt colour plates. The photographer is inspired by the empty rooms and grandiose corridors of space to then dedicate her attention to the architect’s interventions. This artistic-photographic documentation is complimented by texts from wellknown architects, architectural historians, art historians and conservation architects. They highlight the fundamental principles of the project of conservation and complementation.