The Walther Collection is a private international art collection dedicated to collecting and exhibiting contemporary photography with special emphasis on the works of African and Asian artists. It is a dynamic collection, constantly growing and driven by four core activities: collecting, curating, exhibiting and publishing. Each activity is designed to present the works of the artists and to engage them in dialogue with the general public and the specialized field of contemporary art. The Walther Collection encompasses more than 700 works of widely known as well as emerging African and Asian artists, which makes it one of the most comprehensive collections of African photography worldwide. These extensive holdings are contextualized and complemented by historically significant contributions to the art of photography mainly from Germany and the United States, which expand the understanding, conception and history of the medium. The exhibitions and their curators at The Walther Collection will change once a year. Each year, based on a different curatorial emphasis, the collection will be examined and new constellations of the holdings and the new acquisitions will be presented. The Walther Collection will present in the inaugural exhibition a series of four projects in the nine galleries of its three buildings under the curatorial direction of Okwui Enwezor. It will integrate the work of three generations of African artists and photographers and a selection of the work of classical German photographers: Seydou Keïta (Mali), Malick Sidibé (Mali), J.D. 'Okhai Ojeikere (Nigeria), Rotimi Fani-Kayode (Nigeria), Santu Mofokeng (South Africa), as well as August Sander and Bernd and Hilla Becher (Germany). The exhibition series will center on issues of portraiture, identity, body, sexuality and performance. In total 230 works of 31 artists from 13 nations, among them South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Mali, Benin, Cameroon and Senegal, are presented. This comprehensive catalogue contains full-page reproductions of all works on display. It includes contributions by Okwui Enwezor, Virginia Heckert, Kobena Mercer, Chika Okeke-Agulu, Gabriele Conrath-Scholl and Deborah Willis as well as a conversation between William Hartshorn and Artur Walther.
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