In 1998, Julian Heynen, at the time curator at the Kunstmuseen Krefeld, asked Thomas Ruff to prepare an exhibition with architectural photos of the villas Ludwig Mies van der Rohe had designed between 1927 and 1930. The exhibition was meant to mark the modernization and reopening of the two buildings designed by the architect and meanwhile used as museums of contemporary art, Haus Lange and Haus Esters. Ruff started concerning himself with the architecture and contemporary shots of the Villa Tugendhat (Brünn), Haus Lange, Haus Esters, and the Barcelona Pavilion. He tried to find his own way of seeing and photographing the various buildings, relying on all the techniques he had used to date. During the show in Krefeld, Terence Riley (The Museum of Modern Art, New York), who was preparing a retrospective on Mies van der Rohe’s architecture through 1938, approached Ruff and asked him to photograph all the other Mies buildings from the period existing in Europe for the exhibition. Since some of the buildings could not be photographed, Ruff also made use of already existing image material, which he processed digitally.