MANNHEIM.- The Kunsthalle Mannheim is the first museum in the world to be honoring the oeuvre of one of the key female figures in the European avant-garde of the 1920s and 1930s with the extensive retrospective Ré Soupault—Künstlerin im Zentrum der Avantgarde (Ré Soupault—Artist at the Center of the Avant-Garde) from February 13 to May 8, 2011.

“While in the late 1980s Ré Soupault’s rediscovery as a photographer was considered a sensation, we are now happy to be presenting the entire spectrum of her oeuvre for the first time,” writes Dr. Inge Herold, who is curating the exhibition in collaboration with Manfred Metzner, the trustee of Ré Soupault’s estate.

Ré Soupault (1901–1996) was a photographer, fashion designer, journalist, filmmaker, author, and translator at the heart of the most modern art trends in Germany and France. Her path led her from the Bauhaus in Weimar to the metropolises of Berlin and Paris, where she left her mark on the Parisian fashion world. The exhibition provides insight into the artist’s rich creative universe and draws attention to her exciting network of relationships at the center of the avant-garde movement.

The highlights of the exhibition are rediscovered and previously unpublished photographs by Man Ray which Ré Soupault—Rediscovery of a Companion of the Avant-Garde he took of Soupault and her fashion collection (loans from the Centre Pompidou, Paris) as well as works by contemporaries with whom she was friends, such as Henryk Berlewi, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Sonia Delau-nay, Gisèle Freund, Werner Graeff, Florence Henri, Johannes Itten, Germaine Krull, Lucia Moholy, and Umbo (Otto Umbehr).

A remake of Soupault’s famous “transformation dress” is presented in cooperation with the fashion label Schumacher. With a multifaceted supporting program revolving around the themes of photography, film, fashion, and literature, from February 13 to May 8, 2011, the Kunsthalle Mannheim is the center of the avant-garde.