Avant-Garde and the Contemporary

The exhibition brings a distinguished selection of historical and contemporary artistic approaches from the collection as well as from the Artothek des Bundes, administered by the Belvedere, into productive correspondence. Through six narrative strands, the show provides insights into Austrian art since the 1930s and highlights key artistic currents and tendencies. The Belvedere’s collection is conceived as a dynamic structure of constellations and relationships between protagonists, layers of time, attitudes, and new and sometimes contrary concepts.

Toni Schmale and Fritz Wotruba, Maria Lassnig and Sarah Lucas, Ashley Hans Scheirl, and Rudolf Hausner, Carola Dertnig, Rudolf Schwarzkogler, Jakob Lena Knebl, Robert Zeppel-Sperl, Melanie Ebenhoch, and Bruno Gironcoli—works by these and many other Austrian artists in the collection account for the allure of the Belvedere’s holdings from the 20th and 21st centuries. This collection presentation does not imagine the frequently cited “zero hour” of 1945 as the beginning of the Austrian postwar avant-gardes, nor does it chart their linear development. Rather, it attempts to make tangible parallels and crossovers, but also counter-models in art since the 1930s, through six narrative strands: Collections and Fractured Realities, as a start, is devoted to the politico-historical distortions of Austrofascism and National Socialism that have had an impact up to the present day and that have essentially determined the belated reception of modernist tendencies. Surreal Narratives traces the enduring presence of surreal aesthetics. The narrative strand Abstractions gathers historical and contemporary approaches to non-figurative art. Forms of the Informal oscillates between gestural expression and strategies of chance. Performative Bodies tells of the use of the human body as artistic material, as well as the critical confrontation with its representation. Finally, Re-visions takes a look at artistic negotiations of historiography and the social present and reconnects to the beginning of these artistic narratives in Austria.

The exhibition showcases works by around 140 artists. It follows overt and hidden traces to establish both clear-cut but also surprising links. Ultimately, collections articulate a wide range of relationships: between protagonists, layers of time, attitudes, and new and sometimes contrary concepts. The resulting interplay between the avant-garde and contemporary is sometimes obvious, sometimes surprising – a testament to dynamics and urgencies, continuities and ruptures.

Curated by Luisa Ziaja, curator, Collection Contemporary Art.

With works by:
Marc Adrian, Anna Artaker, Christian Ludwig Attersee, Josef Bauer, Herbert Bayer, Gustav Kurt Beck, Walter Behrens, Anna-Sophie Berger, Renate Bertlmann, Wander Bertoni, Lieselott Beschorner, Linda Bilda, Maria Biljan-Bilger, Kamilla Bischof, Herbert Brandl, Arik Brauer, Günter Brus, Linda Christanell, Canan Dagdelen, Gunter Damisch, Svenja Deininger, Verena Dengler, Carola Dertnig, Heinrich Dunst, Melanie Ebenhoch, Veronika Eberhart, VALIE EXPORT, Greta Freist, Padhi Frieberger, Adolf Frohner, Ernst Fuchs, Marcus Geiger, Gelatin, Bruno Gironcoli, Gottfried Goebel, Roland Goeschl, Ingeborg G. Pluhar, Lily Greenham, Eva Grubinger, Nilbar Güreş, Albert Paris Gütersloh, Maria Hahnenkamp, Rudolf Hausner, Matthias Herrmann, Wolfgang Herzig, Laura Hinrichsmeyer, Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Wolfgang Hutter, Tess Jaray, Nicolas Jasmin, Anna Jermolaewa, H+H Joos, Martha Jungwirth, Birgit Jürgenssen, Tillman Kaiser, Johanna Kandl, Barbara Kapusta, Friedrich Kiesler, Erika Giovanna Klien, Alfred Klinkan, Jakob Lena Knebl, Kiki Kogelnik, Cornelius Kolig, Joseph Kosuth, Brigitte Kowanz / Franz Graf, Elke Silvia Krystufek, Maria Lassnig, Anton Lehmden, Sonia Leimer, Angelika Loderer, Inés Lombardi, Sarah Lucas, Marko Lulić, Marcin Maciejowski, Dorit Margreiter, Till Megerle, Josef Mikl, Franziska Mikl-Wibmer, Marie‑Louise von Motesiczky, Ulrike Müller, Muntean Rosenblum, Agnes Muthspiel, Henrike Naumann, Hermann Nitsch, Matthias Noggler, Oswald Oberhuber, Walter Obholzer, Silke Otto-Knapp, Vevean Oviette, Wolfgang Paalen, Florentina Pakosta, Vicken Parsons, Friederike Pezold, Helga Philipp, Josef Pillhofer, Margot Pilz, Agnieszka Polska, Hilda C. Polsterer, Lisl Ponger, Peter Pongratz, Markus Prachensky, Karl Prantl, Lotte Profohs-Leherb, Florian Pumhösl, Liesl Raff, Arnulf Rainer, Gerhard Richter, Gerwald Rockenschaub, Gerhard Rühm, Francis Ruyter, Anna Schachinger, Ashley Hans Scheirl, Johanna Schidlo-Riedl, Alfons Schilling, Markus Schinwald, Toni Schmale, Isa Schmidlehner, Rudolf Schwarzkogler, Anne Speier, Lilly Steiner, Curt Stenvert, Alexander Stern, Ingeborg Strobl, Erwin Thorn, Philipp Timischl, Borjana Ventzislavova, Rudolf Wacker, Trude Waehner, Kay Walkowiak, Kurt Weber, Peter Weibel, Lois Weinberger, Susanne Wenger, Franz West, Ingrid Wiener, Fritz Wotruba, Erwin Wurm, Traute Zemb-Wolsegger, Robert Zeppel-Sperl, Heimo Zobernig, Feri Zotter

Press contact: Désirée Schellerer / presse [​at​] belvedere.at / T +43 1 79 557-303

View press materials here.