The permanent exhibition presents a survey of his oeuvre spanning four decades. Special exhibitions show a wide range of artists and subjects including Marcel Duchamp and Kurt Schwitters who influenced Tinguely significantly, companions such as Arman, Niki de Saint Phalle, Yves Klein as well as current art trends along Tinguely’s ideas.
The Luminator at the Euroairport
Jean Tinguely’s Luminator was designed in 1991 for the Kulturgüterzug Kulturgüterzug (“train of cultural goods”), an exhibition organized by Klaus Littmann at Messe Basel in June of that year. For the exhibition artists such as Daniel Spoerri, Bernhard Luginbühl and Eva Aeppli each designed a goods wagon. After the exhibition the sculpture was bought by the Swiss Bank Coperation. Following Tinguely’s death on 30 August 1991 and in accordance with his own express wish and proposal, the Luminator was installed in the entrance hall of the Swiss Railway station in Basel, where it greeted visitors to the city for many years. In 2005 it was donated by the UBS (Union Bank of Switzerland with which the SBC had merged) to Museum Tinguely. It now stands at the Euroairport, thus fulfilling Tinguely’s intention that it should enjoy the greatest possible degree of public exposure.
