BASEL.- Starting in January 2017, Annette Schönholzer will be the new operative and administrative director of the Kunstmuseum Basel. She takes over from Stefan Charles, who, as announced in early October, will leave the museum after many years as its director of administration to direct the culture department at the Swiss Radio and Television Corporation (SRF). Annette Schönholzer is hardly a newcomer to the local as well as international cultural scene: From 2002 until 2014 she held various leading positons at Art Basel, including that of Co-Director alongside Global Director Marc Spiegler. She ultimately headed the New Initiatives section there, before two years ago branching out on her own as a cultural consultant with her agency.connect the dots.

Annette Schönholzer: “For me, assuming the operational and administrative management of Kunstmuseum Basel together with Josef Helfenstein is an honor and a challenge I accept gladly and with great enthusiasm. I am very much looking forward to the task, and indeed to working with the entire team. Together we will strengthen the great renown of the institution still further and successfully move the Museum and its three sites forward in the future.” Josef Helfenstein: “I am delighted that we were able to recruit Annette Schönholzer for this important position at Kunstmuseum. She brings with her several years’ management experience, strategic know-how, boasts excellent knowledge of the cultural world and is extremely well connected, both regionally and internationally, which is particularly important for me. Furthermore Annette Schönholzer is intimately familiar with Kunstmuseum, and not just since she highly successfully helped conceive the strategy for the celebrations marking the re-opening of and extension to the Museum in April and subsequently organized the event. I am sure that in Ms. Schönholzer we will in future have an accomplished manager with enormous business and communicative expertise in our team. And on a personal level I am very much looking forward to working closely with her.”