Július Koller, U.F.O.-nautická Kultúrna Situácia 1.,2.,3. (U.F.O.), 2002, colour photographs

Multiple Realities: Experimental Art in the Eastern Bloc, 1960s–1980s is an extensive survey of experimental art made in six Central Eastern European nations between the 1960s and 1980s. Including both rarely seen and newly reconstructed works, the exhibition weaves together a complex story of artists questioning how, when and where art could exist, and exploring the varied meanings it might hold for society. Despite their geographical proximity, the artists featured in the exhibition encountered different conditions for daily life and artmaking, as they confronted varying degrees of control and pressure exerted by state authorities. Charting a generation invested in experimentation, Multiple Realities sheds light on ways that artists refused, circumvented, eluded and subverted official systems. Often infused with wit and irony, the works on view demonstrate both conceptual and formal innovation, often underpinned with an [...]

Installation view, Hugo Canoilas: Spiral, Casa do Campo Pequeno, Centro de Artes, Porto, 2024

Casa do Campo Pequeno is pleased to present Spiral by Hugo Canoilas. This intervention by Canoilas includes a series of large-format works made between 2012 and 2023, from his participation in the XXX São Paulo Biennial to one of his most recent presentations as part of the FLAD Drawing Prize.
The architecture of the Casa do Campo Pequeno is praised through the installation of paintings on fabric that unfold according to the harmonious relationship between work and space, creating an upward spiral movement. In this way, pre-existing chronological and thematic relationships are broken, transforming the reading of this exhibition into a new order in relation to perspective—which spiral movement allows, quoting the composer Sun Ra and his desire for movement towards infinity.The Etruscan character of these paintings can be found in their drawn form, which is constantly adjusted through layers that oscillate between the wall and floor. From the wall, where the image is [...]

Nilbar Güres, The Moment, 2024, performance for a 1842 Square Meter Drawing, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, Photo: Nilbar Güres

The exhibition ‘The Cynics Republic’ offers a counter-narrative of the history of performance. It looks at the emergence of ‘performative practice’ from Antiquity onwards and seeks to recover the relevance of the values of ancient cynicism – truth, self-sufficiency, endurance, sobriety and free sexuality – in the context of today’s social and ecological challenges. ‘The Cynics Republic’ offers visitors the chance to experience an exhibition constructed as a score and that will be renewed on a daily basis over the course of three weeks thanks to the use of dematerialized resources (scores, protocols, films and sound pieces) from the national collections of the Centre national des arts plastiques (Cnap) and the Kontakt collection in Vienna. ‘The Cynics Republic’ proposes to approach the resources of these collections from the perspective of a repertoire of immemorial gestures. Works will be activated on a daily basis by [...]

Werner Feiersinger, Untitled (Pula), 2022, colour photograph mounted on dibond

Werner Feiersinger, sculptor and photographer, is showing photographs of utopian projects of industrial architecture and landscape design in Istria under the title Korzo. »The many industrial buildings – high-rise buildings, petrochemical plants, ships, coal storage facilities, port buildings, steel structures – tell of the history and development of these places, but also of the failure of political ideologies and utopias. The associated political background subtly resonates as a parallel narrative.« (Feiersinger)

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Exhibition view, Forms of Shadow at Secession, Vienna, 2024, Photo: Iris Ranzinger

The Vienna Secession is delighted to host the major group exhibition Forms of the Shadow; curated by Sunjung Kim, Artistic Director of the Art Sonje Center in Seoul. As an artist-run institution dedicated to the display of contemporary art in all of its manifestations, the Secession is proud of its history as a preeminent global centre for the presentation of new creative ideas and its concomitant engagement with the most urgent concerns of our time. Confronting the complex realities of life and current global challenges, we believe a core part of our mission is to grapple with questions of cultural and social policy, and to showcase ambitious visions that spark public debate. These concerns are precisely encapsulated by Forms of the Shadow. The exhibition casts light on contemporary shadows unveiled by the global pandemic, the climate crisis, and geopolitical tensions. Through this thematic lens, it invites viewers to reflect upon the [...]

Nilbar Güres, Ergen Odasi / Adolescent Room, 2014, textile colour, textile, pearls, embroidery on red fabric, Photo: Markus Wörgötter

On the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Wiener Städtische Versicherungsverein, the main shareholder of the Vienna Insurance Group, Unknown Familiars brings together all six collections of the Group, which encounter each other, their different focuses and histories of development, for the first time. It is in this regard that they are unknown familiars – related, though with never having met before. The collections now complement each other in a precise selection of works, the presentation of which occupies an entire floor of the Leopold Museum, comprising over two hundred works of various genres from different periods. Young, contemporary art meets the modernism of the interwar period; the avant-garde of the 1970s meets contemporary Austrian positions. Starting out from the collection of the Czech Kooperativa – represented with a selection of works from the period from 1900 to 1950 – a network of thematic and stylistic references [...]