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German Football Museum honours Günter Netzer with a blockbuster exhibition
In an immersive media installation, visitors experience German football’s first pop star at first hand. The 1,000-square-metre exhibition space is transformed into a powerful visual space featuring multiple projections, seamlessly integrating Netzer’s world of football with film and photography on a grand scale. Noises, sounds and tones capture the atmosphere of the 1970s. Outstanding exhibits from Netzer’s career are integrated into the show, which operates at the intersection of film and performance. The result is a sweeping, immersive experience that presents Günter Netzer and his era from an unusual perspective.
Complementing, but separate from, the large-scale production is the photography exhibition ‘Netzer by Tomikoshi’. On display are largely unpublished works by the Japanese master photographer Masahide Tomikoshi from Netzer’s time at Borussia Mönchengladbach and Real Madrid.
Manuel Neukirchner, Director of the German Football Museum, who conducted extensive interviews with Günter Netzer for the exhibition, says: “The major Netzer exhibition at the German Football Museum is a tribute to an extraordinary figure from an equally extraordinary era. Football romantics in particular, who revere the 1970s as an era of non-conformist individualists and revolutionary styles of play, will be in for a real treat.”
The special exhibition NETZER. THE SEVENTIES. The first pop star of German football is being staged in collaboration with Borussia Mönchengladbach. As such, it also marks the Bundesliga club’s 125th anniversary.
Exhibition catalogue
Manuel Neukirchner: Netzer. The Seventies. Published by Die Werkstatt, Bielefeld, 1st edition 2025. 272 pages. Featuring a biographical and historical overview of Günter Netzer and the 1970s, as well as an extensive interview with Günter Netzer in four chapters. Numerous unpublished photographs, €39.90, ISBN 978-3-7307-0744-9
Podcast about the exhibition
In the German Football Museum’s ‘Wie war das damals?’ legends podcast, Manuel Neukirchner looks back on the career of German football’s first pop star in a four-part series of conversations with Günter Netzer. Netzer’s teammates, including Franz Beckenbauer, Wolfgang Overath, Rainer Bonhof and Paul Breitner, also have their say.
The podcast ‘Wie war das damals?’ from the German Football Museum is available on various platforms, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube.
