In around 60 works of 19 male and 16 male artists deals with the “Art collection and archive“-Head Cosima Rainer and that Artist Robert Müller curated exhibition “Swim in the dark“ with current artistic perspectives on the concept of the creative individual. She examines how the modern hope that art is a supposedly authentic expression of the inner self and creativity can be a tool for improving life is continued and questioned today.
With Works from the Applied Collectionsupplemented by numerous loans This extensive show will take place in mid-October University Gallery of Applied Sciences in the Heiligenkreuzerhof opened.
Today, creativity plays a fundamental role in subjectification processes. There is a tension between one’s own desire and social expectations, between desire and imperative. The title of the exhibition, “Swimming in the Dark,” points to the deep waters and dark depths of self-doubt and feelings of inadequacy that are often associated with creative processes.
“Be your own brand”: Self-realization and self-presentation are currently among the basic components of the entrepreneurial self. Self-realization and presenting yourself are not only very popular these days on social media. As “self-educators” par excellence, artists are prototypical for the creative existence that has become a requirement profile for society as a whole. The resulting contradictory expectations and depths of creativity in the context of art production often become the subject of artistic practice themselves.
The works shown in the exhibition question the social mechanisms in aesthetic capitalism and the associated myth of the new. Strategies of repetition, outsourcing, inaction, refusal, revaluation and leveling play a central role. They explore the conditions for shaping the self in artistic production and in working on one’s own life or look for exit strategies from the instrumentalization of the pathos of creativity and freedom.
With works by
Uli Aigner, Monika Baer, Linda Bilda, The Critical Ass (Anke Dyes, Niklas Lichti) & Michele Di Menna, Josef Dabernig, Hanne Darboven, Verena Dengler, Jana Euler, Harun Farocki, Jessyca R. Hauser, Alexander Hempel, Richard Hoeck & John Miller, Helena Huneke, Martin Kippenberger, Josef Kramhöller, Michael Krebber, Tonio Kröner, Maria Lassnig, Ghislaine Leung, Lee Lozano, Friederike Mayröcker, Luzie Meyer, Sigmar Polke, Ulla Rossek, Jack Smith, Josef Strau, Jean-Marie Straub, Martine Syms, Franz West, Tanja Widmann, Amelie von Wulffen, Min Yoon
Curated by: Cosima Rainer and Robert Müller
Press tour
Speakers: Petra Schaper Rinkel, Rector of the University of Applied Arts Vienna Cosima Rainer, Curator, Head of Art Collection and Archives, University of Applied Arts Vienna Robert Müller, Curator, Exhibition Designer, Art Collection and Archives, University of Applied Arts Vienna
Datum: October 15, 2024, 10:00 a.m
Art: Press conference
Ort: University Gallery of Applied Sciences in the Heiligenkreuzerhof
Schönlaterngasse 5/ Staircase 8
1010 Wien
Austria