The documentary exhibition that will be completed with original works in Basel revisits the Museum Tinguely AHOY! ports of call, beginning with Paris, where Tinguely started his career in 1953 when he moved there with his first wife Eva Aeppli. There he met artists, curators, and friends such as the curator and museum director Pontus Hultén, the artist Yves Klein, and by no means least the artist Niki de Saint Phalle, who was to become his second wife. It was in Düsseldorf in 1959, where Galerie Schmela staged Tinguely’s first solo show in Germany, and legend has it that on 11 March of that year, the artist had 150.000 flyers printed with his Manifest Für Statik scattered from a plane circling over the city. His appearances in Düsseldorf also brought him to the attention of ZERO group artists such as Heinz Mack, Otto Piene, and Günther Uecker. That connection took Tinguely to Antwerp, where he was instrumental in bringing about the exhibition Vision in Motion – Motion in  Vision. Tinguely’s strong ties with Amsterdam were forged early on in his career through his friendship with the director of the Stedelijk Museum, Willem Sandberg. Thus it was Sandberg who entrusted Tinguely, Daniel Spoerri and Pontus Hultén with the organisation of Bewogen Beweging, a major touring exhibition of kinetic art that opened at the Stedeljik in 1961. Tinguely had an especially large number of works in that show, which helped to enhance his status as one of the leading kinetic artists of his time.