Varied, surprising and probing: KMSKA unveils programme for 2025
In 2025, The Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp (KMSKA) will feature as many as three major exhibitions and various shows in the print room and 19th-century halls. Visitors can expect to encounter resounding names such as René Magritte and Marthe Donas, to daydream in the playful world of Panamarenko, or go on a quaint nocturnal journey past the intriguing sculptures of Hans Op de Beeck. In addition, the Studio Rubens restoration project reaches new heights, visitors can once again count on a surprising programme during KMSKA LATE on Thursday evenings, and the permanent offer is expanding with new guided tours.
In Your Wildest Dreams. Ensor Beyond Impressionism
28/09/2024 – 19/01/2025
With de exhibition In Your Wildest Dreams. Ensor Beyond Impressionism, the KMSKA brings to life Ensor’s whimsical universe. A unique tribute in which Ensor - for the first time - stands side by side with renowned contemporaries such as Manet, Monet or Munch. Important international loans and the Ensor Research Project form the basis for this must-see exhibition. On Thursday 16 January 2025, the largest retrospective of James Ensor will conclude festively with a finissage during KMSKA LATE. Throughout the following weekend, visitors can enjoy Ensor’s visions, masks and satire. And on Saturday 18 January, exceptionally, from 8am to midnight. Stay informed via kmska.be.
Panamarenko. Infinite Imagination
30/01/2025 - 4/05/2025 (in the Print Room)
Panamarenko's life's work is a game without limits in which experimentation takes precedence over result. He does not relinquish reality, but, driven by his curiosity, sets off towards the new, the unexpected and the unknown. For the artist's 85th birthday, the KMSKA is collecting sketches and objects on paper from both private and public collections. The exhibition thus brings his inventive and playful oeuvre to life in the blue halls. It is the perfect opportunity to discover Panamarenko's tireless quest for magic, wonder and poetry.
Panamarenko. Infinite Imagination falls under the project Panamarenko85. An initiative of the Panamarenko Foundation which brings together exhibitions at M HKA, KMSKA, Port House �� Port of Antwerp-Bruges and Cultural centre Knokke-Heist.
Studio Rubens. Enthroned Madonna
20/03/2025 - 29/06/2025 (in the Rubens Gallery)
Rubens was a master at organising his large studio, where he executed complex works efficiently. His preparation was thorough, with many sketches and studies in oil paint. Exceptionally, many of these have been preserved for the Enthroned Madonna Adored by Saints. As part of Studio Rubens, the KMSKA is reuniting the preparatory work with the altarpiece for the first time. Four spectacular oil sketches and a later studio copy bear witness, during this exceptional focus exhibition, to a creative quest.
Moreover, the retouching phase starts in January. To this end, the Enthroned Madonna Adored by Saints will be uprighted. In summer 2025, the restoration will be completed. The restoration of The Adoration of the Magi will then immediately follow in the autumn.
Hans Op de Beeck: Nocturnal Journey
22/03/2025 - 17/08/2025
With Nocturnal Journey, internationally renowned artist Hans Op de Beeck creates his first major exhibition for the KMSKA. The result is an experience that takes the visitor through a nocturnal landscape of sculptural, fictional scenes. They depict a snapshot, frozen in time, and are invariably done in monochrome grey. As if covered in ash. Op de Beeck does not seek a sublime or lavish form of beauty, but rather the poetry of the everyday. It is precisely for this reason that the artist is a guest at the KMSKA, where he explores the boundary between the ephemeral and the timeless.
Collected with Vision. Private Collections in Dialogue with the Old Masters
4/04/2025 - 12/10/2025 (in the 19th-century halls)
The KMSKA is joining forces with Geukens & De Vil Projects in order to give a contemporary injection to the works of the Old Masters in the 19th-century themed halls. For this purpose, post-war and contemporary works by internationally renowned artists from Belgian private collections will be interwoven with the existing museum collection, expanding the transhistorical approach already in place. The exhibition offers a reflection on the history of art collecting and asks probing questions about social issues such as gender, power and identity. The role of museums and collectors is the focal point. Do the interventions create a harmonious dialogue with 700 years of art history, or do they give rise to challenging contrasts?
Trailblazers of the Abstract. De Stijl versus Modern Art circle
29/05/2025 - 7/09/2025 (in the Print Room)
In collaboration with the Nieuwe Instituut Rotterdam, the KMSKA is presenting a unique dialogue exhibition between De Stijl from the Netherlands and the Antwerp Modern Art circle following WWI. Both movements shared the belief that geometrically abstract art could transcend borders and join disciplines. As a result, they cannot be ignored in the network of the European avant-garde. The exhibition in the Print Room shows drawings, paintings, architectural designs, graphic designs and furniture. Works by Theo Van Doesburg and Jozef Peeters, among others, highlight both the shared ideals and the differences in visual language between the two art movements.
Eugeen Van Mieghem
2/10/2025 - 11/01/2026 (in the Print Room)
On the occasion of a significant donation by the Eugeen Van Mieghem Foundation, the KMSKA is showing the multi-faceted oeuvre of the idiosyncratic, socially committed Antwerp artist. With loans from public and private collections, the exhibition focuses on Van Mieghem's impressive pastels and drawings. As a ‘raving reporter’, he continuously drew a bristling city at the beginning of the 20th century: he depicted both the arduous work at the port and the amusements of the better-off.
Donas, Archipenko & La Section d'Or. Enchanting Modernism
4/10/2025 - 11/01/2026
With Donas, Archipenko & La Section d’Or. Enchanting Modernism, the KMSKA is throwing the doors to colourful abstraction wide open. As one of the first female cubists in the world, Marthe Donas helped to re-establish the artists' collective La Section d'Or after the First World War. But she is more than just a pioneer in her field. As a first, this exhibition focuses on this Antwerp artist's significant position in the circuit of the international avant-garde. By means of important loans from internationally renowned museums, the KMSKA shows Marthe Donas as an enterprising woman with a gigantic network that united artists. Moreover, the exhibition places her side by side with the modernist interventions of sculptor Alexander Archipenko and other important names from the cosmopolitan artist circle, such as Piet Mondrian.
Magritte. La Ligne de vie
15/11/2025 - 22/02/2026
In 1938, René Magritte gives a lecture at the KMSKA on his vision of reality. He discourses on the origins and development of his art, as well as the history of the surrealist movement in Belgium. Based on a selection of works from the accompanying slide show, the KMSKA presents an intriguing exhibition in which Magritte acts as his own curator, so to speak. As a connecting figure between surrealism in Antwerp and Brussels, he is shown alongside Antwerp surrealists such as Marcel Mariën and Léo Dohmen.
It is no coincidence that this exhibition runs parallel to the one on Marthe Donas. Both exhibitions represent two different directions within modernism. And although Magritte also initially experiments with abstraction, he nevertheless rejects this kind of painting and chooses his own path. He wants to paint ideas. He is rather indifferent as to form.
A brimming museum offering
In 2025, besides a varied KMSKA LATE programming on Thursday evenings, the museum will also present a new Artist in Residence. Top chef and art historian Matthieu Beudaert explores how the KMSKA's collection might taste. Details to follow.
Our regular offer is also expanding. With the new dementia-friendly guided tours, the museum has the opportunity to focus even more on inclusivity and accessibility. In addition, visitors can tour the museum's wartime past with the guided tour The KMSKA during World War II. Among others, the walk-in tours for the blind and visually impaired, family tours, queer tours and Radio Bart will also remain part of the permanent offer next year.
Furthermore, the regular museum activities will continuously provide additional experiences. For children, the museum focuses on The 10, theatre for toddlers and Art Camps. The open restoration studio and the curator talks contribute to extra depth, while visitors can get creative themselves at the open studio and the drawing tours. Moreover, Art on the Lawn will also land in the museum garden again next summer.
