It takes a certain kind of genius to produce world class art. And another level of genius to do so in different media. Like Rebecca Horn, for example, the subject of the 2021/2022 exhibition at the Bank Austria Kunstforum Wien.
- Comprehensive look at Horn’s interconnected oeuvre
- First such exhibition in Austria for many years
- Runs Sept 28, 2021 – Jan 23, 2022
- See also:
Multiple media and interconnectivity
(Rebecca Horn; Konzert der Seufzer (Venedig), 1997; photo: Attilio Maranzano; © Rebecca Horn)
When you immerse yourself in turn-of-the-century art in Vienna, you imagine the ability to create across multiple genres and media is a relic of the past, when folk like Otto Wagner could design a building, but also the furniture that went in it.
A brief look at Rebecca Horn’s biography teaches us otherwise.
The German-born artist has directed opera in Spain (and designed the sets and costumes). Her films have featured in a solo exhibition in London’s Tate Modern. Her permanent 3D Flying Books Under Black Rain Painting graces an entrance of the Harvard Art Museums. You can buy her poetry at Amazon.
Yet, despite all the above, she is perhaps best known for her remarkable performance art, installations, and kinetic sculptures.
Exhibitions featuring Horn’s works appear in prestigious galleries and museums across the world. And her art appears in the collections of such institutions as Paris’s Centre Pompidou and New York’s Guggenheim and MoMA.
Vienna, however, has not seen a major examination of her work for many years. The Bank Austria Kunstforum Wien corrects that gap in the city’s artistic portfolio with a comprehensive exhibition that offers insight into her working process and the threads that run through her oeuvre.
Despite its diversity, Horn’s art often reflects a degree of continuity and interconnectivity, for example through connections to exterior influences or through prevailing associations between her works across media and time: what storytellers might describe as a bundle of red threads.
As Horn herself put it in a 2014 interview:
You try not to talk about the past too much as an artist. Instead, you focus on the continuity of your work.
Source
The exhibition pays hommage to the diversity and interconnectedness of Horn’s output by incorporating, for example, graphic arts, sculptures, installations and films from across her career (including films that document earlier performances and artistic interventions).
Dates, tickets & tips
Immerse yourself in Horn’s genius from September 28th, 2021 to January 23rd, 2022. A standard entrance ticket gets you into the exhibition (or use an appropriate sightseeing pass).
Note that the Kunstforum Wien has no permanent exhibition, so only opens when a major exhibition is on.
Autumn and early winter is prime time for art exhibitions in Vienna, so look out for top events at all the top art museums.
For example, the Kunsthistorisches Museum has a Titian exhibition (from October 5th), the Kunst Haus Wien showcases the work of photographer Susan Meiselas, the Albertina gives us a remarkable Modigliani exhibition, and the Albertina Modern explores Schiele and self-portraiture.
How to get to the Horn exhibition
Follow the tips in the article about the Kunstforum Wien.
The gallery is a throw of a medieval meat pie from the historical centre of Vienna. Which means the surrounds are anything but contemporary: they first consecrated the church opposite around 1200, for example, a time when performance art involved rather more juggling and mead.
Address: Freyung 8, 1010 Vienna