Basel, 30 September 2008

Roche reaffirms its strong and lasting commitment to the Museum

The Board of Directors of the Tinguely Museum has appointed Roland Wetzel as the new Museum Director. Currently working at the Fine Arts Museum in Basel as a management assistant and curator, 43 year-old Roland Wetzel will take up his new post on April 1st, 2009. He is a graduate of the University of Zurich, where he studied art history, business management and musicology. Recently, Roland Wetzel attracted a lot of attention for his internationally acclaimed exhibition on Robert Delaunay. He has also been involved in a large number of other exhibition projects, including the “Georg Reinhart Collection” (Museum of Arts, Winterthur), “Ernst Ludwig Kirchner”, “Donald Judd” or “Willem de Kooning” (Fine Arts Museum, Basel). Roland Wetzel has published regularly.

"We are delighted to have found a respected Museum Director with broad experience and a strong international reputation", said Board Chairman Franz B. Humer, commenting on the appointment. "We are confident that under Roland Wetzel’s leadership, the Museum will continue to develop the special position that it occupies among the museums in Basel, Switzerland and beyond".

Speaking of his appointment, Roland Wetzel said: "The Tinguely Museum is a huge success story and an outstanding example of commitment to the arts. It is dedicated to an artist whose innovative creativity, versatility and sense of humour provide an excellent springboard for devising interesting and attractive exhibition projects. Being invited to head up this internationally renowned museum, which right from the outset has delighted the public, families and school groups as well as art connoisseurs, is a fantastic opportunity, and I look forward to working with everyone involved".

The Tinguely Museum was founded by Roche in 1996 to mark the company's centenary. Today, it is still regarded as the major embodiment of the Basel healthcare company's commitment to the arts. The Museum centres around the iron sculptures of Jean Tinguely, one of the most important Swiss artists of the 20th century and a close friend of Paul and Maja Sacher. Situated on the banks of the Rhine, at the heart of the picturesque Solitude Park and adjacent to the Roche site, the Tinguely Museum was designed by the world-famous Swiss architect Mario Botta. Jean Tinguely (1925-1991) grew up in Basel and was a member of the Parisian avant-garde in the 1950s and 60s. His kinetic works revitalised and revolutionised the “static” art world. The Museum’s permanent collection presents a changing selection of the artist’s machine sculptures, reliefs and drawings from all periods of his career. The Museum also regularly stages varied, vibrant and comprehensive temporary exhibitions dedicated to associates and contemporaries of Tinguely such as Niki de Saint Phalle, Eva Aeppli, Daniel Spoerri, Bernhard Luginbühl and Yves Klein, role models such as Marcel Duchamp, Kurt Schwitters and Max Ernst, as well as related, more recent trends such as contemporary kinetic art.

The Museum is currently running the popular "Aeppli Donation" exhibition. The exhibition is the largest donation made to the Tinguely Museum since its inauguration in 1996. It comprises 45 bronze heads by Eva Aeppli, two early paintings and a small Nana sculpture by Niki de Saint Phalle and a meta-mechanical relief by Jean Tinguely. The donation by Christoph Aeppli, the artist's brother, also affords the Museum an opportunity to present three cloth dolls by Eva Aeppli.

About Roche

Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, Roche is one of the world’s leading research-focused healthcare groups in the fields of pharmaceuticals and diagnostics. As the world’s biggest biotech company and an innovator of products and services for the early detection, prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases, the Group contributes on a broad range of fronts to improving people’s health and quality of life. Roche is the world leader in in-vitro diagnostics and drugs for cancer and transplantation, and a market leader in virology. It is also active in other major therapeutic areas such as autoimmune diseases, inflammatory and metabolic disorders and diseases of the central nervous system. In 2007 sales by the Pharmaceuticals Division totalled 36.8 billion Swiss francs, and the Diagnostics Division posted sales of 9.3 billion francs. Roche has R&D agreements and strategic alliances with numerous partners, including majority ownership interests in Genentech and Chugai, and invested over 8 billion Swiss francs in R&D in 2007. Worldwide, the Group employs about 80,000 people. Additional information is available on the Internet at www.roche.com.

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