Art Rewarded

Text: Dörte Welti

I meet Isabelle Guggenheim at the headquarters of Baloise Group – in Basel, of course, in the so-called Baloise Park. In 2015, work began here to dismantle the old buildings and erect modern ones: the group headquarters with 700 workplaces, the Mövenpick hotel and the training centre. The headquarters was occupied from August 2020, in the middle of the pandemic – which is why Guggenheim’s pet project could not yet take off: the publicly accessible gallery inside the building, permanent and approachable, always there for people.

Before she shows me the art collection, we drive in her BMW X3 through Basel’s midday traffic to the Dreispitz, an up-and-coming district where Herzog & de Meuron have already staked their ground and an art scene is emerging. Our destination is the studio of Dominique Rietzler, an unconventional self-taught artist, born in Mulhouse and at home in Basel for over 30 years. He is to design Baloise’s stand at this year’s Art Basel – an installation, a studio with work in progress. But why does a group that is an insurer and a bank have anything to do with art at all?

Far-Sighted Commitment

“Baloise Group has collected art for several decades,” Guggenheim explains. “Over 20 years ago, in 1999, we launched the Baloise Art Prize to promote emerging artists – in cooperation with Art Basel.” A specialist jury, freshly assembled each year, makes a pre-selection; the medium doesn’t matter, whether sculpture, painting, photography or moving image. Just before the opening the shortlisted artists present themselves, then the jury decides overnight on two finalists to be honoured.

The commitment doesn’t end there: each winning artist receives 30,000 francs. Baloise also buys works for its own collection and donates works by each laureate to a European museum – this year to the MMK Frankfurt, in the past to the Hamburger Kunsthalle, Vienna’s MUMOK or Berlin’s Museum für Gegenwart. A rare chance for newcomers. Baloise also finances the laureates’ future museum exhibitions – a further commitment worth 250,000 francs.

Art for Dessert

Back at Baloise Park, over lunch at the Puro restaurant, there is art for dessert – so much that, as a layperson, I struggle to take it all in. In the cellar, the temperature-controlled picture archive awaits: more than 1,700 works collected since the late 1940s. “At first we only bought local Basel artists,” Guggenheim explains, “since 1960 we’ve collected internationally too.” And the provenance? “It can be verified completely for every work.”

We set off on a Tour de Baloise, from the roof garden to the ground floor – art hangs almost everywhere. The building designed by Diener & Diener forms, in the stairwell, a gallery across several floors; since the pandemic measures fell away, it is finally getting its due. The curator is Frédérique Hutter, who also gives newly trained curators a chance. This closes the circle with the prize’s ethos of support. “It’s not about sponsorship,” Guggenheim clarifies. “We want to foster quality in art. If you want quality, you have to make it possible.” A perfect win-win – for artists, museums, staff and the public.