Hitlers Berlin bunker transformed into a modern art gallery

A wealthy Polish-born advertising agent, who claims to collect art that he does not understand, has transformed Nazi dictator Adolf Hitlers five-storied, 120-room bunker on Berlins Reinhardtstrasse into a modern art gallery.

London, Apr.26 : A wealthy Polish-born advertising agent, who claims to collect art that he does not understand, has transformed Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's five-storied, 120-room bunker on Berlin's Reinhardtstrasse into a modern art gallery.

Christian Boros had the historic complex reopened this week after 66 years as a private gallery containing 80 contemporary works by 57 artists, including Damien Hirst, Wolfgang Tilmans, Anselm Reyle, Elizabeth Payton and Olafur Eliasson.

According to The Independent, Boros bought the derelict bunker in 2002 declaring that for him it was "love at first sight" and built a James Bond-style penthouse for himself and his wife Karen on its roof. During the next five years he transformed the interior.

Boros, 44, said: "Others might have turned the place into a wine cellar. But that would have been wrong in my view. Our approach has been to fill a Third Reich monument with the highest form of intellectual freedom - art. For me, it is a very meaningful process."

This is one gallery where art connoisseurs need not be distracted by the annoying trill of a mobile phone - the bunker's walls see to that. At almost three metres thick, the concrete and steel sides ensure that even the hardiest mobile loses its signal inside.

Many of the exhibits in the collection are housed in windowless rooms. The Danish artist Olafur Eliasson's 1995 Berlin Colour Sphere is a suspended giant ball of mirrors that casts rainbow coloured geometric patterns across an entire chamber.

Another work by Santiago Sierras is comprised of eight, giant tar-coated steel girders that punch horizontally through one of the interior walls.

To create enough space for the collection, three architects were employed to remove 40 of the bunker's original 120 rooms. The artists were invited to design their own individual bunker showrooms for each work and every one has a different shape, with some nearly 40 ft high.

From the beginning of June the collection will be open to the public, but those interested in viewing it will have to make an appointment via the Boros collection website.

ANI