The ZKM | Center for Art and Media remembers its founding director - a mastermind whose ideas and concepts have shaped the institution to this day.
As early as the late 1980s, the art and architecture historian recognized the far-reaching changes that electronic media would bring to art and society. Appointed as the founding director of the ZKM, he presented a further development of the »Konzept '88« in January 1989, which significantly expanded the original idea for the ZKM. Klotz, who had previously founded the German Architecture Museum (DAM) in Frankfurt, combined the vision of a center for artistic research and media education ("Media for the citizen") with the establishment of a museum for contemporary art. He also insisted that the ZKM should be complemented by a university - the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design.
With the founding of ZKM, a place was to be created that would not research and present the electronic arts in isolation, but would recognize that artists have always explored the latest technologies of their time. In this sense, Klotz stated in 1992:
"ZKM has the task of fathoming the creative possibilities of a connection between the traditional arts and media technology in order to achieve pioneering results for the coming century. [...] Just as painting will not be made superfluous by computer graphics, the concert grand piano will not be thrown away because the synthesizer exists." (Klotz, 1989)
After the German Architecture Museum, ZKM became Klotz's second major lifetime achievement. With visionary power, political perseverance and great courage, he worked to turn an idea into reality. However, Klotz was only able to witness part of the full development of ZKM into a globally recognized institution of great radiance - he deceased far too early in 1999.
On the occasion of his 90th birthday, the ZKM remembers Heinrich Klotz with great gratitude and honors his life's work. Without him, the ZKM would not exist in its present form. His legacy lives on - in art, in research and in the ongoing exploration of the possibilities of new media.