Designed by the Ulm-based architectural firm Braunger Wörtz,[3] the White Box is a light-filled, three-story minimalist structure that houses the Walther Collection's main galleries, and hosts thematic exhibitions and commissioned projects.

Events of the Self featured works by Sammy Baloji, Yto Barrada, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Candice Breitz, Allan deSouza, Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Samuel Fosso, David Goldblatt, Romuald Hazoumé, Pieter Hugo, Seydou Keïta, Santu Mofokeng, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Zanele Muholi, Ingrid Mwangi, Jo Ratcliffe, August Sander, Berni Searle, Malick Sidibé, Mikhael Subotzky, and Guy Tillim.

[9] The exhibition included portraits, figure studies, cartes de visite, postcards, books, and album pages from southern and eastern Africa, featuring images made from the 1860s to 1940s by A. M. Duggan-Cronin and numerous unidentified and unknown photographers.

The historical works were presented together with photography, video, and archive projects by contemporary artists including Carrie Mae Weems, Santu Mofokeng, Sue Williamson, Sammy Baloji, Guy Tillim, David Goldblatt, Zwelethu Mthethwa, Zanele Muholi, and Jo Ratcliffe.

Distance and Desire was the culmination of this three-part exhibition series in 2011 and 2012 at the Walther Collection Project Space[10] and the international symposium Encounters with the African Archive, which took place in November 2012 at New York University.

The exhibition, organized by Brian Wallis, examined how the formal tools of classification, particularly archives, typologies, and time-based series, have opened critical challenges to the synthetic conventions of photographic realism.

The Order of Things included photographs and installations by Karl Blossfeldt, Bernd and Hilla Becher, J. D. 'Okhai Ojeikere, August Sander, Richard Avedon, Stephen Shore, Samuel Fosso, Guy Tillim, Zanele Muholi, Ai Weiwei, Zhang Huan, Song Dong, Thomas Ruff, Thomas Struth, Ed Ruscha, Dieter Appelt, Eadweard Muybridge, Kohei Yoshiyuki, and Nobuyoshi Araki.