The tasks of the non-profit Bettina Heinen-Ayech Foundation - Foundation for Art, Culture and International Dialogue also include the conservation of important cultural assets. At the request of the Solingen Art Museum, the foundation has now financed the restoration of the oil painting "Platane bei Basel, 1959" from the Switzerland cycle by the artist Erwin Bowien (1899-1972). The elaborate restoration was carried out by the qualified conservator Olga von Gregory, who has extensive expertise in the restoration of paintings by the artist Erwin Bowien.

Fifty years after the death of the well-known artist Erwin Bowien (1899-1972), the important German painter, Nazi opponent and exile Erwin Johannes Bowien is experiencing a new renaissance. The Bettina Heinen-Ayech Foundation - Foundation for Art, Culture and International Dialogue has taken this as an opportunity to finance the restoration of the oil painting "Platane bei Basel, 1959" from the Switzerland cycle by the artist Erwin Bowien (1899-1972) at the request of the Solingen Art Museum.

Erwin Bowien had a special relationship with Switzerland. The country where he spent his youth and where he found important friends, collectors and sponsors. It was in this context that the artist's "Switzerland Cycle", one of his most important creative cycles, was created. A large number of Swiss cityscapes and landscapes were captured on canvas and paper. The depictions of urban life and the hustle and bustle of everyday life in the large Swiss cities were particularly important to the artist. One painting that documents this character very well is the oil painting "Platane bei Basel" from 1959, which the Bettina Heinen-Ayech Foundation commissioned to be restored by the qualified restorer Olga von Gregory, currently the most experienced restorer of the master's paintings.