calendario eventi  :: 

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3/7/2008

Three exhibitions

Wiener Secession, Wien

Thomas Hirschhorn - "Das Auge"

"Das Auge" ("The Eye") is the title of my exhibition in the Secession. "Das Auge" has nothing to do with Georges Bataille – who I admire greatly. As an artist, I want to make a work that in no ways bows down to historical facts. With "Das Auge" I want to give form to this resistance against a form. I want to produce a work that does not bow down to facts and that resists historical facts. And I want to create a universal truth with this form.

"Das Auge" resists facts, it resists by seeing – by only seeing. The exhibition, the work "Das Auge" is intended as a postulate. A postulate is an assertion given form. The form of this postulate – "Das Auge" – consists in the fact that "Das Auge" sees but "Das Auge" does not understand. And no one else is expected to understand "Das Auge", no one has to be in agreement with the "Das Auge", and no one has to enter into contact with "Das Auge". "Das Auge" sees, "Das Auge" shows, "Das Auge" names, and "Das Auge" 'is'. "Das Auge" sees and is present, it sees and is thereby present and it is present because it sees.

With "Das Auge" I want to create the conditions for a dialog or confrontation – in whatever way; that is the assertion – and I want to do this with this work. I want to do it by "Das Auge" 'only' seeing. For 'only' seeing facilitates the opening. Opening up for the other, opening up in order to become implicated in the work. "Das Auge" 'only' sees, and it therefore remains autonomous. And "Das Auge" insists on seeing without understanding.

"Das Auge" does not see everything – but it sees everything that is red. "Das Auge" only sees the color red. Thus it can only show red, it can only name red, and it can only 'be' red. The red – that "Das Auge" sees – is the blood of those wounded and killed by war and terror, the red is the blood of slaughtered baby seals, the red is the red of models protesting against the wearing of fur coats, the red is the red of branching capillaries, the red is the red of national coats of arms that use the color red, and the red is the red of cardboard hearts, the red is simply just the color 'red'.

The color red creates the connection and the point of reference – beyond understanding – and beyond information, beyond opinions, and beyond comment.

"Das Auge" refuses to see, to show, to name, and to be anything else but "Das Auge".

March 2008


THOMAS HIRSCHHORN, born 1957 in Bern, lives and works in Paris.

SOLO SHOWS (Selection): 2008 Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico; 2007 Jumbo Spoons & Big Cake, Musée d’art contemporain, Montreal; Arndt & Partner, Berlin; Stephen Friedman Gallery, London; Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris; 2006 Kestnergesellschaft, Hanover; CCA Wattis Institute, San Francisco; Gladstone Gallery, New York; 2005 Museu Serralves, Porto; Institut of Contemporary Art, Boston; Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; 2004 Centre Culturel Suisse, Paris; 24h Foucault, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, in the context of the “Nuit Blanche”; Musée Précaire Albinet, Cité Albinet, (in cooperation with Les Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers), Aubervilliers.

GROUP SHOWS (Selection): 2008 Carried Away - Procession in Art, Museum of Modern Art Arnhem; Peripherer Blick und kollektiver Körper, Museion, Bozen, Collage: The UnMonumental Picture, New Museum, New York; 2007 Peripherer Blick und kollektiver Körper, Museion, Bozen; Heart of Darkness, Walkert Art Center, Minneapolis; The Unhomely, Phantom Scenes in Global Society, Seconde Biennale Internationale d’Art Contemporain, Biacs 2, Seville; How to Live Together, 27ème Biennale de São Paulo; Into me / Out of Me, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York; Swiss Made+2, Präzision und Wahnsinn, Kunstmuseum, Wolfsburg; Volksgarten, Die Politik der Zugehörigkeit, Kunsthaus Graz; 2005 Dionysiac, Centre Pompidou, Paris; Monuments for the USA, CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco; Material Time / Work Time / Life Time /, Reykjavik Arts Festival, Living Art Museum, Reykjavik; Drawing from the Modern 1975 – 2005, Museum of Modern Art, New York; Hayward Gallery, London; Universal experience. Art, Life, and the Tourist’s Eye, MCA, Chicago; 2004 La bellesa del fracàs / El fracàs de la bellesa, Fundación Joan Miró, Barcelona; 2003 GNS, Palais de Tokyo, Paris; Gesellschaftsbilder, Images of Society, Kunstmuseum, Thun; Accessoiremaximalismus, Kunsthalle, Kiel; Common Wealth, Tate Modern, London; 2002 Basics, Kunsthalle Bern; Documenta 11, Kassel.

The exhibitions are realized through support of:
Erste Bank – Partner of the Secession
Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur
Wien Kultur
Friends of the Secession

The exhibition is supported by:
pro helvetia
hs art service austria
INKU AG
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Isa Rosenberger

Isa Rosenberger engages with social and political developments in her artistic work. The artist is particularly interested in political upheaval and both its social as well as economic consequences— often with a specific focus upon a post-socialist Europe and the changes (there) in urban space and its concomitant public sphere. In order to do this, the artist enters into a communicative exchange with contemporary witnesses whom she interviews about their personal experiences and perspectives upon (recent) historical events. Her interlocutors not only become protagonists in her work, but also to an extent coauthors time and time again.

A fundamental theme here is the question regarding the construction of reality and, specifically in this context, the power of images. Rosenberger questions the relationship of internalised, “mental” images as well as medially communicated images with the aim of constructing different, alternative stories and interpretations of history (and the present). As prime examples for this purpose she investigates the perception of ideologically charged monuments and architecture and how it changes. The artist juxtaposes images representing differing perspectives in her engagement with this topic. They lose nothing of their respective stature through the change in perspective, yet their ideological power becomes reflexible and subject to question as a result.

Isa Rosenberger presents three works in the Seccession that investigate processes of social transformation in post-socialist Europe. Alongside her new video NOVÝ MOST (2008) it is also possible to see the series of photographs WARSCHAUER NIKE (2007) and the video installation EIN DENKMAL FÜR DAS FRAUENZENTRUM (THE MAKING OF) (2005-06) in the Galerie.

NOVÝ MOST is named after the eponymous bridge built between 1967-72 in Bratislava and for Isa Rosenberger represents an alternating view—also within the context of her work—namely of the perspective from East to West. Documentary and staged scenes as well as archive material from the bridge’s time of origin become a cinematic collage on the dynamic relationship between East and West from the (subjective) perspectives of three women from three different generations, presented in an installational display.


A catalogue (German/English) accompanying the exhibition will be published and will include an essay by Marina Grzinic and a conversation between Isa Rosenberger and Barbara Steiner.


ISA ROSENBERGER, born 1969 in Salzburg, lives and works in Vienna.

SOLO SHOWS (Selection): 2007 Miniatury turystyczne, Österreichisches Kulturforum Warsaw; 2004 Ein Zeichen der Zeit, Kunst im Porschehof, Porsche Holding Salzburg; 2003 Schöne Aussicht - Modelle in verdichteten Räumen, Kunstverein Langenhagen; 2002 Sarajevo Guided Tours, Sarajevo International Airport (in cooperation with Sarajevo Center for Contemporary Art), Sarajevo; OF(F) lived spaces (with Michael Zinganel), Galerie Pohlhammer, Steyr; 2001 ... Wirklichkeit ..., Kunstverein Wolfsburg; 2000 Studio 2000, Schnitt Ausstellungsraum, Cologne; 1999 Betaversion, Galerie 5020, Salzburg.

GROUP SHOWS (Selection): 2008 Schrumpfende Städte – Interventionen, Liebfrauenkirche, Duisburg; Du Dialogue Social, Motorenhalle Dresden; 2007 Shrinking Cities, Cranbrook Art Museum, Detroit; Lange nicht gesehen. Begegnungen mit dem Museum auf Abruf, Museum auf Abruf, Vienna; Im Geröll moderner Zeiten I, Galerie Gölles, Fürstenfeld; 2006 Shrinking Cities, Pratt Manhattan Gallery, New York; Every Day ... another artist/work/ show, Salzburger Kunstverein; Donaumonarchie, Billboart Gallery, Bratislava; Geschichte(n) vor Ort – eine Ausstellung rund um den Wiener Volkertmarkt, Projekt im öffentlichen Raum, Vienna; Es ist schwer das Reale zu berühren/Videoarchiv, Grazer Kunstverein; 2005 Grosser Kunstpreis des Landes 05, Galerie im Traklhaus, Salzburg; Schrumpfende Städte 2 – Interventionen, Galerie für zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig; 2004 Trading Places, Pump House Gallery, London; International Filmfestival, Mumbai.

The exhibitions are realized through support of:
Erste Bank – Partner of the Secession
Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur
Wien Kultur
Friends of the Secession

The exhibition is supported by:
The British Council
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Miklos Erhardt - Temporary settings

In his work, Miklós Erhardt explores artistic potential in terms of socio-political and economic issues. Using interventionist and documentary methods he creates social situations that become the point of origin for further observations. His projects are often developed in collaboration with other artists, most notably within the context of Big Hope, an artist group which he co-founded in 1998 (www.bighope.hu). In his participatory projects he engages with individual perception on the part of specific groups of economic and political reality as well as with the lack of representation of underprivileged people such as the homeless, migrants or inhabitants of run-down districts. The particular situation in Hungary as a post-socialist country subject to a radical period of readjustment since 1989 is dealt with in like manner, as are the effects of globalisation on the labour market and diverse local communities.

The video documentation HAVANNA (2006) and the installation FOOTNOTE TO BARE LIFE—26 CARDBOARD BOXES THAT CONTAIN (ARGUABLY) ALL MY STUFF TO DATE (2008) form the central focus of the exhibition TEMPORARY SETTINGS in the Secession. Both works deal thematically with differing aspects of mobility, social status and socio-political parameters as well as with state-controlled surveillance of public space and of private voyeurism.

HAVANNA was originally conceived by Miklós Erhardt as a social research project and developed during the process into a series of immediate reflections on the potential and validity of artistic interventions in sensitive social settings. Havanna is a housing complex from the 1970s on the periphery of Budapest, about which numerous negative as well as racist myths proliferate: it is considered to be a dangerous ghetto inhabited by the social underclass where drug trafficking and prostitution flourish. Erhardt rented and renovated one of the several empty local shops for a couple of months. In this way he could integrate himself into the local community and was able to counter the abounding clichés about Havanna with a more differentiated image in his documentation.

Whereas it is scarcely possible for the inhabitants of Havanna to move out on account of their poverty, the work FOOTNOTE TO BARE LIFE—26 CARDBOARD BOXES THAT CONTAIN (ARGUABLY) ALL MY STUFF TO DATE exhibited in the Secession showcase highlights the theme—amongst other things—of mobility currently demanded by the labour market. At the same time it can be read as a playful manipulation of a kind of »existential minimalism«. Both works are placed in relation to one another in an installational presentation especially created for the Secession.


A catalogue accompanies the exhibition with texts by Edit Molnár and Hajnalka Somogyi.


MIKLÓS ERHARDT, born 1966 in Budapest, lives and works in Budapest.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS(Selection): 2007 Béni soit qui bon y pense, Studio Protocoll, Cluj Napoca (with Miklós Mécs and Judit Fischer); The Social Engine – Exploring Flexibility, Stúdió Galéria, Budapest (with the artist group Reinigungsgesellschaft); 2006 With or Without Me, Galerija SKC, Belgrade; 2004 The Society of the Spectacle, Liget Galéria, Budapest; 2002 Manafest, Műcsarnok-Kunsthalle, Budapest (with Tibor Várnagy); 1999 L.A.B, Stúdió Galéria, Budapest.

GROUP SHOWS (Selection): 2008 Revolution I Love You. 1968 in Art, Politics and Philosophy CACT - Thessalonica Centre for Contemporary Art, Thessalonica; 2007 The Other City, Romanian Cultural Institute, New York; On the Outside, ACC Gallery, Weimar; »Arrivals
The exhibitions are realized through support of:
Erste Bank – Partner of the Secession
Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur
Wien Kultur
Friends of the Secession

image: Thomas Hirschhorn

Press conference: Thursday, July 3, 2008, 11 a.m.
Opening: Friday, July 4, 2008, 7 p.m.

Wiener Secession
Friedrichstrasse 12 - Wien

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