Image: Kunsthalle Emden, Bonn
Kunsthalle Emden is devoting a cabinet exhibition to the meeting point between its own collection and the work of Emden artist Bodo Olthoff in 'Am Hafen. Die Sammlung der Kunsthalle Emden begegnet Bodo Olthoff', on view from 21 March to 2 August 2026. The exhibition brings together around 20 maritime works from the museum’s holdings with more than 40 seascapes by Olthoff, who was born in 1940. It is presented as a comparison of artistic approaches to the sea, the coast and the changing life of ports.
According to the museum, the exhibition focuses on the fascination of images linked to the shoreline, seafaring and the sea’s ambivalent character. The collection works on view were created over the past hundred years by different artists and offer a compact view of the range of maritime motifs in painting. Among the artists named in the presentation are Lyonel Feininger, Emil Nolde and Frans Masereel. Against those works, Olthoff’s paintings provide a local perspective rooted in Emden and its harbor.
The museum describes the Emder Ratsdelft, part of the city’s inner harbor, as central to the city’s identity and to the region’s cultural history. Its account traces the area from earlier periods when ships were moored there, through wartime destruction, to reconstruction after 1945. The exhibition text also stresses that, like many harbors worldwide, the Ratsdelft has undergone shifts in use and meaning over the past century. Olthoff, who grew up in the war-damaged city, experienced that transformation firsthand.
The artist’s biography in the museum text links his work to that urban and maritime setting. Olthoff is described as having been shaped by the ruins of the postwar city as a place of childhood play, by proximity to the coast and the islands, and by family stories of long sea journeys. He learned to sail on the Ems as a child. After training and working as a graphic designer in Stuttgart, he studied design and art in Münster in the 1970s, as well as painting at the Kunstakademie Münster/Düsseldorf. The museum also notes that he lived and worked for almost 20 years as a freelance painter in Manslagt in East Frisia before moving his studio to Aurich.
For Kunsthalle Emden, 'Am Hafen' is also the first presentation of Olthoff’s work at the museum. The institution says it is placing particular emphasis on his graphic work, which it presents as evidence of technical skill and a range of visual forms that move between figuration and abstraction. The titles, the museum adds, often lend the works a poetic narrative quality. By setting these pieces beside maritime works from the collection, the exhibition invites viewers to look again at how different artists have approached sea, coast and harbor imagery.
The exhibition list includes Heinz Braun, Karl Dönselmann, Lyonel Feininger, Hanns Ludwig Katz, Thomas Kohl, Paul Kunze, Christopher Lehmpfuhl, Frans Masereel, Emil Nolde, Bodo Olthoff, Franz Radziwill and Jan Wiegers. The illustrated work used by the museum is 'Emder Mole' from 1983 by Bodo Olthoff. Kunsthalle Emden lists its address at Hinter dem Rahmen 13 in Emden, with opening hours Tuesday to Friday 10 am to 5 pm, Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays 11 am to 5 pm.
