Sprüth Magers Berlin

Sprüth Magers has expanded from its roots in the Rhineland to become an international gallery dedicated to exhibiting the very best in groundbreaking modern and contemporary art. Sprüth Magers retains close ties with the studios and communities of the German and American artists who form the core of its roster.

The gallery emerged amid an extraordinary outburst in contemporary art that took place in Cologne in the early 1980s. Its first iteration as Monika Sprüth Gallery opened in 1983 with an exhibition of paintings by Andreas Schulze and was soon followed by exhibitions of Rosemarie Trockel and Peter Fischli David Weiss. Over the next few years George Condo, Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler and Cindy Sherman all showed at the gallery and have continued to do so for the last thirty years. In 1992 a second gallery opened in Cologne under the name of Philomene Magers. Early exhibitions included Ad Reinhardt’s ‘Black Paintings’, Robert Morris’s ‘felt pieces’ and John Baldessari’s photographs and text paintings from the 1960s. The two galleries merged into a single entity in 1998 and in 2000 the Munich space opened with Ed Ruscha’s exhibition ‘Gunpowder and Stains’.

In 2003 Sprüth Magers Lee opened in London with an exhibition of works by Donald Judd. In 2007 Sprüth Magers relocated to Grafton Street, Mayfair; on show was a selection of new photographs by Andreas Gursky. In 2008 the gallery established its flagship space in a former dancehall in Berlin Mitte – not far from the city’s Museum Island. The gallery debuted with Thomas Scheibitz and George Condo.