With their incisive pictorial language, witty metaphors and the art of being explicit and ambiguous at the same time, many of the cover illustrations of the German weekly magazine “Der Spiegel” have become anchored in the collective memory of its readers: over a period of nearly fifty years they have been not only a gauge of the moods of society, but quite often also a documentation of contemporary history. Their creators – such as Braldt Bralds, Boris Artzybasheff, Dieter Wiesmüller or Michael M. Prechtl – are among the best of their genre. The exhibition presents over two hundred original illustrations created for “Der Spiegel” by sixty handpicked illustrators, showing them together with their respective cover titles.

Curators Stefan Aust, Stefan Kiefer
Co-Curator Kathrin Pokorny-Nagel, Head of the MAK Library and Works on Paper Collection

Between November 2004 and January 2006 the exhibition was on show on following venus: Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Hamburg; c/o Berlin/The Cultural Forum for Photography, Berlin; Museum für angewandte Kunst Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main; NRW-Forum Kultur und Wirtschaft, Düsseldorf; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg, Stuttgart; Littmann Kulturprojekte im ehem. Museum für Gestaltung, Basel; Museum of American Illustration/The Society of Illustrators, New York. The exhibition was organized by the Deichtorhallen Hamburg in cooperation with Spiegel-Verlag.

Catalogue "DIE KUNST DES SPIEGEL. Titel-Illustrationen aus fünf Jahrzehnten / THE ART OF DER SPIEGEL. Cover Illustrations Over Five Decades", edited by Stefan Aust and Stefan Kiefer, with contributions by Stefan Aust, Stefan Kiefer, Steven Heller and Walter Grasskamp as well as an interview with Eberhardt Wachsmuth, German/English, 264 p., illustrations, teNeues-Verlag, Kempen, Spiegel-Verlag, Hamburg, EUR 29,90