Hilti Art Foundation, the white cube next to the black one

From the street it looks like an extension of the Kunstmuseum, and plenty of visitors treat it that way. That’s a mistake. The Hilti Art Foundation is a separate institution, with its own collection and its own taste, and to my mind it’s the most satisfying hour of art you can spend in Liechtenstein.

A family of industrialists and their pictures

The foundation belongs to the Hilti family, the tool makers of Schaan. Its own website says family members have bought art since the 1970s, but serious collecting began in 1997, and the foundation followed a year later to secure its future. Today it combines the collection of the Martin Hilti Family Trust with the private collection of Caroline and Michael Hilti.

It stands on two legs. One is European classic modernism, painting and sculpture from about 1880 to 1950, taking in Expressionism, Cubism, Constructivism and Surrealism. The other is art since the Second World War, with concrete art, Zero, Minimalism and abstract painting after 1980. There are more than 500 works, with several each by Picasso, Klee, Kirchner, Beckmann, Giacometti, Calder and Sophie Taeuber-Arp. Among them is Umberto Boccioni’s 1913 sculpture «Unique Forms of Continuity in Space», the striding figure that seems to push into the wind.

If the company interests you, my page on Hilti in Liechtenstein covers it. Here it’s all about the art.

A white cube beside a black one

The building was finished in May 2015 by the Basel architects Morger + Dettli. It’s a cube of ground white concrete paired with the Kunstmuseum’s black one and physically joined to it. Entry is shared, so you pay in the foyer of the Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein and a staircase takes you up into the first gallery.

Inside there are three large galleries and a tall, light-filled stairwell that both separates and links them. What I like most is that each floor has its own light. In the basement it filters down from the stairwell, on the first floor it’s purely artificial and on the second it’s blended with daylight. That’s why I’d go from the bottom up, to see the colours shift from floor to floor.

What’s on in 2026 and 2027?

From 8 May 2026 to 17 May 2027 the foundation shows «Abstract. In Focus», about 60 works on abstraction. It grows out of three recent purchases, by Carmen Herrera, Wassily Kandinsky and Mark Rothko, and surrounds them with pieces from the collection to trace three routes, letting go of the object, geometric construction and colour-field painting.

The picture I’d go for is the Rothko, «No. 6, Sienna Orange on Wine» of 1962, which the foundation has just bought and which was the occasion for an evening with Christopher Rothko. Around it you’ll find a 1933 Mondrian, an Albers from the homage-to-the-square series, Kandinsky from a 1908 Murnau study to «Entre Deux» of 1934, Paul Klee, Joan Miró, Jackson Pollock and a Giacometti bust. The full list, over thirty names, is on the Kunstmuseum’s exhibition page.

It isn’t a vast show. It’s designed to be looked at slowly, and in a small museum that’s a relief. The foundation calls its stairwell both a designed route and an architectural experience, so give it a minute on each landing.

The practical side

Hours and prices are the Kunstmuseum’s, since that’s the way in. Tuesday to Sunday, the doors are open between 10:00 and 17:00, except on Thursday, when they stay open until 20:00, and Monday is a rest day. Tickets are CHF 15, concessions CHF 10, and under-16s don’t pay. On Wednesdays nobody pays.

The media guide, launched in 2025 and made with the Berlin studio tonwelt, is free. It has the curator’s commentary, interviews, music and even theatre, and runs on your own phone or on a device lent at the desk. I’d switch it on in the Rothko room.

Is it worth it if modern art isn’t your thing?

My honest answer is yes, for a practical reason. It’s small, you’re through in an hour without flagging, and the building alone justifies going in. If abstraction leaves you cold, stick with the Mondrian and the Rothko, which are pictures you get at a glance.

To plan a full day along the street, my order is in the guide to Liechtenstein’s museums, and the surroundings are on the page about the Städtle.