The Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art to present Anne Imhof’s Fun ist ein Stahlbad, the artist’s first solo exhibition in Portugal.
The exhibition presents a substantial body of newly produced works conceived specifically for the Serralves Foundation’s Museum and unique, 45-acre campus, where the building’s architecture is seamlessly integrated into the surrounding landscape of Serralves Park. It is curated by Inês Grosso, Chief Curator of the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art.
The exhibition’s title, Fun ist ein Stahlbad, draws from Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s book The Dialectic of Enlightenment (1947), in which the philosophers argue that “fun” in the modern world ceases to function as a space for freedom and instead mirrors more discreet forms of control. This central tension — between the promise of freedom and the disappointments of reality — is the conceptual core of Imhof’s presentation.
Fun ist ein Stahlbad is comprised of several site-specific artworks, such as large-scale sculptures and paintings, and is anchored by a newly commissioned, 60-foot-long steel swimming pool, buried into the grounds of the Pátio do Ulmeiro, just outside the Museum. Engaging directly with the Museum’s distinctive, Álvaro Siza-designed architecture, the monumental installation unfolds from the outside into the Museum’s interior galleries, fully activating the patio, a space designed by Siza to draw the surrounding landscape into the Museum. Within it, several sculptures and paintings explore themes of abandonment, fragility, and the pervasive sense of emptiness of war and states that don’t respect human life.
Additional works on view include Citizen (2025), a new 4-channel film work premiering at Serralves. Featuring performers, actors, musicians, and dancers, the work unfolds on the stage of Anne Imhof’s DOOM, shown in New York earlier this year at the Park Avenue Armory, yet on a screen that the architecture dissolves into an undefined “house of hope.”
Inês Grosso, Chief Curator, Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, said,
“We have been working with Anne Imhof and her studio on this project for more than two years, and it is particularly meaningful that this exhibition — composed mainly of new works, including large-scale sculptures and a new piece created specifically for the Park —takes place at Serralves. It has been many years since a woman artist was commissioned to create a work conceived especially for the Park, which reinforces both the importance of this project and the significance of this moment.”
The curator added that
“Imhof is one of the most important artists of her generation; the way her practice moves across performance, film, music, sculpture, painting, and installation speaks directly to Serralves’ longstanding commitment to interdisciplinary work. This exhibition marks a new phase in her practice, more restrained and more rigorous, placing sculpture and the relationship with architecture at the center of the visitor’s experience, and opening a critical engagement with the present, in a world marked by renewed uncertainty and instability.”
Anne Imhof, Fun ist ein Stahlbad, December 12th, 2025 – April 19th, 2026 Serralves
The project was developed in close collaboration with architect Andrea Faraguna and produced with the support of Sprüth Magers and the artist’s studio.
All images are courtesy of nvstudio – Serralves Foundation.
About the artist
Anne Imhof (b. 1978, Giessen) is recognized as one of the most distinctive and influential voices in contemporary art today and was ranked among the “25 Most Influential Women” in 2022 by the Financial Times. She completed her studies at the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main in 2012.
For the 57th Venice Biennale in 2017, she presented her work FAUST in the German Pavilion, for which she was awarded the Golden Lion for Best National Participation. FAUST was later named one of the “25 Best Art Works of the 21st Century” by Frieze magazine. In 2025, she premiered her landmark performance DOOM at the Park Avenue Armory in New York, which was met with widespread critical acclaim. Imhof has held solo exhibitions at Tate Modern in London (2019), the Palais de Tokyo in Paris (2021), the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2022), and Kunsthaus Bregenz (2024). Imhof lives and works between Berlin and New York.
About
The framework for the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art was developed with the creation of the Serralves Foundation in 1989. In 1991, award-winning architect Álvaro Siza Vieira was commissioned to design the new museum on the grounds of the Serralves Estate. In 1996, construction of the building and the planning of a museum program began
The Museum was inaugurated on June 6, 1999, with the exhibition Circa 1968. This groundbreaking exhibition, reflecting a radical decade of art-making that corresponded with a period of profound social and political change in Portugal and around the world, was a manifesto of the Museum’s international ambitions and the historical starting point for the Museum´s future collection and artistic program.
Founded in 1989, in Porto, Portugal, the Serralves Foundation is dedicated to contemporary culture and fostering dialogues with audiences of all backgrounds and ages through contemporary art, architecture, cinema, the landscape and environment, and other critical issues for society and the future.
With an exceptional group of institutions that include the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, the Villa, the Park, and the Manoel de Oliveira Cinema House, Serralves has been designated by the Portuguese government as a National Monument, the highest attainable heritage classification. One of the most highly visited institutions in the country, it aims to present audiences with programming that addresses the most critical issues facing society and its future.
