The Leopold-Hoesch-Museum is a museum of fine arts. Its collection includes important works of classical modernism, concrete art, the ZERO movement and contemporary art. It shows exhibitions of modern and contemporary art and thematic exhibitions. As the art museum of the city of Düren, which has been an important location for the industrial production and processing of paper since the 18th century, the LHM houses not only painting and sculpture but also a large graphic collection and works of paper art. It is structurally closely linked to the neighboring Düren Paper Museum, which has a technical and cultural-historical focus.
The LHM sees itself as an open place of cultural and social exchange, inviting its visitors to engage with works of art and to discuss current issues. Originally conceived as a universal museum in the tradition of a civic educational institution, the institution was donated to the city of Düren in 1905 by the Leopold Hoesch family. Born in Düren in 1820, the entrepreneur Leopold Hoesch came from the Düren industrial dynasty of the same name, which expanded into the Ruhr region with the founding of the Hoesch AG iron and steelworks in Dortmund in 1871.
As one of the few buildings to survive the extensive destruction of Düren in 1944, the neo-baroque Art Nouveau building designed by architect Georg Frentzen is now part of the city's cultural heritage. In 2010, it received a generous extension by architect Peter Kulka.
After the war, the Museumsverein Düren made it its task to promote the development of the collection through purchases, donations and gifts of works of art. The collections also experienced extensive growth through the establishment of the Günther Peill Foundation and the Hubertus Schoeller Foundation in 1986 and 2004, respectively, which have actively supported the work of the LHM ever since.
In accordance with its public mission as the art museum of the city of Düren, its cooperation with national and international institutions, cultural workers and artists, and its structural connection with the Papiermuseum Düren (Düren Papermuseum), the LHM is a discourse platform for Düren's urban society and for the cultural landscape of the Euregio Meuse-Rhine, in whose institutional network Very Contemporary it participates.
