this hall measures 600 m² and is free of supporting pillars. From the lobby, three single-flight staircases arranged one behind the next provide access to the two upper storeys. Like the galleries in the 2nd upper storey, the large hall in the 1st upper storey enjoys natural top lighting. The foundation stone for the extension was laid in 2008 and the new building was inaugurated in July 2010. Realized by the same architectural office, the new building perpetuates the architectural idiom of the original structure. During the two-year-long period of closure, the original building was completely renovated and brought up to current technical standards. Available now in the two new exhibition halls of the extension building – both free of supporting pillars – are altogether 2000 m² of surface area. The Klee Halle is positioned on the right-hand side of the foyer of the old building, and is mainly used for temporary exhibitions. With a clearance space of 6.4 m, the hall is illuminated artificially by more than 500 spotlights. A narrow staircase in the rear connects the ground floor level with the new upper hall. The entire exhibition surface of the Kunstsammlung am Grabbeplatz now amounts to more than 5000 m². The K21 in the Ständehaus On 18 April 2002, the museum building known as the Ständehaus am Kaiserteich was inaugurated in the presence of German then President Johannes Rau, and became the second main pillar of the Kunstsammlung for modern and contemporary art. Between 1876 and 1880, the Ständehaus in Düsseldorf was erected in the historicist neo-Renaissance style by architect Julius Raschdorff. For many years, the Ständehaus accommodated the Provincial Diet of the Prussian province of the Rhineland. The Parliament of the Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia met there between 1949 and 1988. Following the relocation of the Parliament, the Ständehaus remained empty and unused for 14 years. Surrounding the building's central public square – which takes the form of a spacious piazza – are four wings containing continuous arcade passageways. The three-year conversion of this representative building in the historicist style was undertaken by the architects Kiessler+Partner of Munich. They created a modern museum building with a striking glazed domed roof in the form of an elongated cloister vault, composed of 1919 sheets of glass, which shapes the building's aesthetic appearance. While the outer façade has been preserved, nearly all original fixtures were removed from the interior.