A new contemporary art museum is slated to open next year in Slovenia in the foothills of the Julian Alps. Named after its founders, Slovenian philanthropists Igor and Mojca Lah, Muzej Lah will house the Fundacija Lah art collection.
On its website, the Swiss-based nonprofit foundation says it “supports and promotes local and international projects across the cultural spectrum, including visual art, theatre, film, dance and music.”
The collection of around 800 works has been built by the couple over the last 30 years. It includes pieces by over 100 international and Slovenian artists including Joseph Beuys, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, Anselm Kiefer, William Kentridge, Zoran Mušič, and Neue Slowenische Kunst. It also features works by contemporary artists Anne Imhof, Theaster Gates, and Hito Steyerl. Many of them have never been viewed by the public before.
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David Chipperfield Architects, founded by Pritzker Prize winning British architect Sir David Chipperfield, have designed the 55,000-square-foot museum in the medieval town of Bled. It will occupy a spot embedded in a hillside beneath Bled Castle, built in 1278, not far from Lake Bled.
“In building the Fundacija Lah art collection over three decades, we also dreamt that one day we’d be able to create a space where these artworks could be shared and discovered,” Igor and Mojca Lah said in a statement. “We wanted to create an institution in Slovenia where visitors from near and far could come together to think and be inspired, a place for the local community and international visitors that celebrates art and brings together some of the greatest artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. It has been a labour of love to see our dream come to life in Bled, a home and deeply reflective place for us.”
In a statement, Sir Chipperfield said the museum is “defined by a series of rooms, courtyards, and terraces that both create an ideal setting for the collection and give the visitor a strong sense of the surrounding landscape.”
Igor Lah, Fundacija Lah’s founder and chairman, is also the president of Vaider Group in Switzerland, the owner of Steklarna Hrastnik, a Slovenian glass producer specialising in premium glassware, and the owner of Srpska fabrika stakla, a glass producer in Serbia. His wife Mojca, the foundation’s co-founder, is treasurer of the Vaider Group, a glass packaging company in Switzerland.