In the second half of 2025, the Nederlands Fotomuseum, the Dutch national museum of photography, will move into its new quarters in the heart of the port of Rotterdam.

Located in Rotterdam's Las Palmas business center since 2007, the Nederlands Fotomuseum has become the Netherlands' most important center for the exhibition, conservation, collection and study of photography. It was founded in 2003 under the impetus of Hein Wertheimer, a passionate amateur photographer who, on his death, donated 22 million guilders (11.2 million euros) to create a museum of photography. For the past twenty years, the institution has been tracing the history of the Dutch photographic medium in all its aspects, from 1842 to the present day. Today, it joins other major national institutions, such as the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum. Continuing to think big, in the second half of 2025 it will move into the Santos building, a recently renovated historic monument located in the harbour of the second largest Dutch city.

INTERNATIONAL BENCHMARK

The building was acquired thanks to a donation from the Droom en Daad foundation, dedicated to art and culture since 2016. Its ultramodern architecture will continue to promote the museum's collection of over 6.5 million photographs, which is expected to grow to 7.5 million images by 2028.
The building, designed by architects J.P. Stok Wzn and J.J. Kanters, is a national heritage site. It opened in 1903 as a warehouse for a Brazilian coffee company. In 2021, the German design department store group Stilwerk restored and transformed it. The current renovation was entrusted to two architectural firms, RHWZ Architekten and WDJArchitecten.

The Nederlands Fotomuseum will include exhibition spaces, a bookshop, a photo library, an education center, community spaces, a café, a darkroom for professional and amateur photographers, and a rooftop restaurant with panoramic views over Rotterdam. The original interior and six floors have been preserved, with a cast-iron column structure and a large basement. Two new floors were added at the top, enveloped by a semi-transparent façade. On the first floor, an atrium was created with a central stairwell running through the building.

THE HISTORY OF DUTCH PHOTOGRAPHY

The special feature of this new facility is also to make the preservation of this heritage of Dutch photography visible to the public through dedicated storage and workshops. The open floor plan and closed facades, with minimal daylight, are thus intended to make it a suitable place to store and display the collection of sensitive photographs and photographic objects.
The museum's collection, directed by Birgit Donker since 2018, who was among other things director of the Mondriaan Fund for Visual Arts and Cultural Heritage, is packed with treasures. The exhibition in the Galerie d'honneur, reconfigured for the new building, remains just as much a centerpiece of the curatorial scheme. This collection of iconic images tells the story of Dutch photography, from the invention of the medium in the early 19th century to the digital age. It includes masterpieces by Anton Corbijn, Dana Lixenberg, Violette Cornelius, Paul Huf, Rineke Dijkstra and Erwin Olaf.

All these changes complete the Nederlands Fotomuseum's ambition to build and develop a truly "international platform for photography".

NEDERLANDSFOTOMUSEUM.NL