ROTTERDAM.- Han Nefkens will continue to collect works by Viktor&Rolf together with the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen and announces today the bequeathal of €300,000 euro, allowing the museum to continue collecting Viktor&Rolf after his death.

The museum Boijmans Van Beuningen now has a total of twenty-four Viktor&Rolf pieces within its permanent collection, making it the platform for contemporary fashion and design within The Netherlands.

“Viktor&Rolf are world cultural heritage: they are artists who - through fashion - give shape and form to today. The museum Boijmans Van Beuningen will ensure that their works - their individuality and genius - can be seen by future generations from across the world” Han Nefkens.

Viktor&Rolf are known for their favouring of a conceptual starting point over the aesthetic, for instance, their approach can stem from a language-game which then restricts and guides their conditions of creation. The most recent piece within this donation exemplifies this: taken from the haute-couture Red Carpet Dressing collection (autumn/winter 2014), this collection was a “meditation on a contemporary obsession”, exploring the possibilities of coercing actual red carpet - through techniques such as knotting, pleating, wrapping and tying - into gowns.

The show-stopping pieces in this donation span a decade. They are taken from Viktor&Rolf ready to wear collections Bedtime Story (autumn-winter 2005-2006); Silver (autumn/winter 2006-2007); The Fashion Show (autumn/winter 2007-2008), NO (autumn/winter 2008-2009), Cutting Edge Couture (spring/summer 2010) and the Shirt Symphony collection (spring/summer 2011). Several pieces from the donation are currently on view in the “Viktor&Rolf: Fashion Artists” retrospective in Rotterdam’s Kunsthal.

Han Nefkens has been collaborating with the museum Boijmans Van Beuningen since 2001, notably with the 2014 exhibition “The Future of Fashion is Now”. The Han Nefkens Foundation has already donated eleven pieces by Viktor&Rolf to the museum Boijmans Van Beuningen - and the museum has also already purchased five pieces with the Foundation’s support.

Working with his personal collection and through the Han Nefkens Foundation (established in Barcelona in 2009), Nefkens is a Dutch-born collector working to connect people through cultural exchange and intellectual stimulation. Realising that some of the biggest names in the cultural sphere can not always fund the production of their major, non-commercial pieces, Nefkens’ focus lies on cultural production and he contributes actively to both the initiation and realisation of contemporary masterpieces. Whilst Nefkens has already supported and worked with Viktor&Rolf on numerous occasions, ensuring that their pieces can remain permanently within the public sphere by donating or loaning them to institutions (something that he intends to continue to do), today the Han Nefkens Foundation concentrates on the support of young and mid-career video artists working internationally.

Sjarel Ex, director of museum Boijmans Van Beuningen: “With Han Nefkens’ long-term support we have hosted some of the most cutting-edge and important exhibitions for fashion, design and contemporary art. I am delighted that he is now giving these pieces by Viktor&Rolf to the museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, further strengthening our collection and position nationally and internationally as the museum for fashion, design and contemporary culture”.