Verso: Tales from the Other Side - at Kunstmuseum Basel
At Kunstmuseum Basel, “Verso. Tales from the Other Side” turns centuries‑old paintings around and lets visitors look at their hidden backs. It’s a rare chance to see how artworks live beyond their polished fronts.
Date: 1 Februar 2025 – 8 Februar 2026
Venue: Kunsthaus Basel, Switzerland
In Basel, Kunstmuseum Basel’s exhibition “Verso. Tales from the Other Side” (1 Feb 2025 – 8 Feb 2026) turns painting on its head — or rather, around. Installed in the museum’s Neubau, the show focuses on the “wrong” side of 14th–18th‑century paintings, inviting visitors to inspect their backs and uncover hidden images, coats of arms and reused panels that usually stay out of sight.
Rather than adding new works, Verso looks closely at the museum’s own collection. Thirty-six paintings are presented in specially designed frames that finally allow both front and back to be seen in a single glance. Many started life as double‑sided altar wings, opened and closed with the rhythm of the liturgical year, still carrying traces of processions, prayers and candle smoke. Others are intimate portraits whose backs quietly bear coats of arms, dates or inscriptions that fix a sitter’s identity long after their face has left living memory.
Some of the most compelling stories belong to famous names. Lucas Cranach the Elder’s portrait of John Frederick the Magnanimous reveals, on its reverse, heraldic clues that it once belonged to a now‑separated pair. Hans Holbein the Younger and his brother Ambrosius appear with a witty mock school sign, likely created as a farewell gift for a friend — a panel designed to be read on both sides like a private joke in wood and paint. Niklaus Manuel Deutsch pushes the format further with a double‑sided panel that pairs the biblical Bathsheba with a startling “Death and the Maiden”, making the simple act of turning the object over part of the artwork itself.
Elsewhere, the verso becomes a site of rewriting and control. A seemingly respectable Dutch nobleman turns out, in the inscription on the back, to be the persecuted Anabaptist David Joris, his posthumous condemnation literally written onto his portrait. In another case, Flemish painter Pieter Snyers repurposes a damaged copper printing plate, transforming its smooth reverse into the support for a delicate still life — an early example of upcycling that underlines how supports, as much as images, move through time. Room by room, what looked like “mere” backs prove to be spaces of devotion, status, censorship and play.
For collectors and art lovers, Verso is a reminder that every artwork is also an object with a biography. Labels, repairs, added coats of arms and half‑erased motifs all speak about who owned these works, how they were used, and what later generations chose to remember or hide. If you’re in Basel over the coming months, this is a show to seek out — ideally with enough time to linger over both sides of each panel. And if it leaves you curious about how today’s artists build histories into their materials, head to artpiq.net to discover emerging voices who are also telling stories from the “other side” of painting.
Kunstmuseum Basel: Verso - The Secret Life of Paintings. Photo: © Kunstmuseum Basel
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