Inge Meijer : the plant collection

From 1945 to 1983, plants stood next to the works of Mark Rothko, Piet Mondrian, Christo and many others. During the 38 years that plants were part of the museum’s policy, you could certainly speak of a ‘collection’. The plant collection included 39 different species. After every exhibition, the plants would be taken away and moved to a new spot. Plants were donated to the museum and a specific person was employed to take care of the collection.

The major part of Inge Meijer’s research was based on documents and photographs of exhibitions found in various archives. In addition to this, she interviewed (former) employees of the Stedelijk Museum in order to get an idea of why plants were originally brought in and how they were used.