AUGUST MACKE HOUSE
FOUNDATION

In 2002 the Foundation's capital base amounted to 2,820,000 Euro, not least of all thanks to generous private donations. For the first time the employment of a full-time Director became possible, as well as the conversion of the part-time job for the Secretariat into a full-time slot.  In 2004 the Foundation purchased land adjacent to the August Macke house on Hochstadenring with an eye toward the planned expansion of the August Macke house.

Upon the merger of Sparkasse Köln and Sparkasse Bonn in 2005 the Foundation was given its present name and now boasts a capital base of some 6 million Euro.

In 2010, with the support of Sparkasse KölnBonn the Foundation financed and implemented comprehensive measures to repair, renovate, and spatially optimize the August Macke house.

Thanks to the generous assistance provided by the German Government's Commissioner for Culture and Media, Minister of State Bernd Neumann, upon the initiative of German Foreign Minister Dr. Guido Westerwelle, and with the support of Landschaftsverband Rheinland, the August Macke House Foundation was able to fully renovate, repair, and spatially reorganize the August Macke house in 1911.

The funds invested totaled some 740,000 Euro: the Federal Republic of Germany provided a grant of 500,000 Euro. Landschaftsverband Rheinland added 48,000 Euro toward the functional rearrangement of the ground floor. For the execution of the first package of measures 90,000 Euro were made available by Sparkasse KölnBonn and 100,000 Euro by the August Macke House Foundation of the Sparkasse.

The renovation and repair measures were part of the plans to expand the building, contents, and mission of the August Macke House, the overall concept for which was developed by Dr. Klara Drenker-Nagels and the accomplishment of which was one of the Foundation's most important objectives.

On 8 November 2012 the Budget Committee of the German Bundestag followed the recommendation of Dr. Guido Westerwelle, Bonn's representative in the Bundestag, to support the planned extension of the August Macke House in the amount of 3.5 million Euro from federal budget funds. Only a few months later the state of North-Rhine/Westphalia signaled that it would assist the construction project in the amount of 1.5 million Euro.

The Nordrhein-Westfalen-Stiftung Naturschutz, Heimat- u. Kulturpflege, announced in the spring of 2013 that it would make available up to 400,000 Euro to furnish the former home and studio of August Macke as a biographical museum dedicated to the artist.

On 17 September 2013 an agreement to finance construction of the building's annex was signed in August Macke's former studio in the presence of German Foreign Minister Dr. Guido Westerwelle, who had made a particular effort to assure the allotment of federal funding. Signers of the accord were the Federal Government's Commissioner for Culture and Media, Minister of State Bernd Neumann, the State Secretary in the Ministry for Family, Youth, Culture, and Sports of the state North-Rhine/Westphalia, Bernd Neuendorf, and the Deputy Executive Chairman of the August Macke House Foundation of the Sparkasse in Bonn, Prof. Dr. Ludger Sander. In 2013 and 2014 Landschaftsverband Rheinland announced that it would support the initial museum installation of the annex in the amount of up to 400,000 Euro. 

On 26 September 2014, the 100th anniversary of the death of August Macke, the city of Bonn issued the permit for the construction of the planned annex to his former home and studio. 

Officiating at the groundbreaking ceremony on 22 June 2015 was the Federal Republic's Minister of State for Culture, Prof. Dr. Monika Grütters. 13 January 2016 marked the laying of the cornerstone, an artwork created by sculptor Petra Siering, who had been awarded the city of Bonn's August Macke Medallion in 2014. On 15 February 2016 the Nordrhein-Westfalen-Stiftung provided the August Macke House Foundation of the Sparkasse in Bonn a grant of 50,000 Euro with the aim of installing barrier-free access by elevator in the annex to the August Macke house. The roofing ceremony was celebrated on 17 June 2016 together with roughly 100 guests. Construction was completed in the autumn of 2017 and the expanded artist's home opened its doors on 3 December 2017 as the August Macke House Museum.