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profil Talk
Systems of Belief

Video

The video is available in German

with Sandro Droschl, Richard Kriesche, Peter Schernhuber 
Moderation: Stefan Grissemann – profil, head of culture

The profil Talk in cooperation with HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark is dedicated to the relationship of technology to society and art and accompanies the thematic group show Systems of Belief, which is shown at the same time. The exhibition presents artistic positions that, for example, do not directly reflect reality through means such as film cameras or blockchain technology, but use them to give expression to unorthodox dogmas and spiritual self-knowledge. The profil Talk provides an opportunity to illuminate the ever-changing relationship between humans and their technological products. While in recent years there has been an increased skepticism towards phenomena such as the automation of work and the rapid developments in the field of artificial intelligence, in the field of contemporary art there is a great interest in imagining new and sometimes better worlds through technological advances.

On the panel:

> Sandro Droschl is director of HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark. Since 2000 he has worked as a curator, then also as director for the Kunstverein Medienturm, Graz, in addition to guest curating at other institutions. Droschl curated numerous exhibitions of contemporary art and edited over 30 publications.

> Richard Kriesche is an artist, art and media theorist. His artistic fields of work include photo art, video art, computer art, net art, installations, performance and multimedia art. Kriesche is currently being honored with a large solo exhibition at the Museum der Moderne Salzburg and one of his works can also be seen at HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark.

> Peter Schernhuber is, together with Sebastian Höglinger, festival director and managing director of the Diagonale – - Festival of Austrian Film. Schernhuber studied theater, film and media studies as well as history at the University of Vienna.

> Claudia Slanar is an art historian and curator of the Ursula Blickle Video Archive and the Blickle Cinema at Belvedere 21, Vienna. Slanar works at the interface between visual art and video/​film and is the author and co-editor of several monographs and texts, including a monograph on the American filmmaker James Benning (2007).

> Moderator Stefan Grissemann is a film critic and head of the culture section of the news magazine profil. Grissemann has edited numerous film reviews, as well as published in books and catalogs. As an author, he has devoted himself to the work of the American film director and screenwriter Edgar Georg Ulmer, among others.

More contributions

Kathy Rae Huffman
FROM CYBERFEMINISM 
UNTIL NOW

Video

Kathy Rae Huffman’s lecture traces the evolution of cyberfeminism since the 1990s: it connected women in the digital sphere, challenged existing power structures, and presented examples — from VNS Matrix to contemporary digital activism — that highlight critiques of platform corporations, AI cultures, and global inequalities.

Kathy Rae Huffman 

Karin M. Schmidlechner 
Styrian women during and after National Socialism

Video

In her research and in the volume Aus dem Blickfeld (Out of Sight), co-edited with Heimo Halbrainer, Karin Maria Schmidlechner demonstrates that the lived realities of Styrian women during the Nazi era and the postwar period were diverse and ambivalent. Hence, she broadens the scholarly discourse on their daily lives while simultaneously deconstructing common narratives such as that of the conformist woman or the so-called rubble woman.”

Karin M. Schmidlechner 

Eva Ursprung
The Art of Surfacing

Slide show

Eva Ursprung, _Dock_, 2026

With the exhibition The Art of Surfacing, HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark presents the multifaceted work of Austrian artist, musician, and curator Eva Ursprung, who was awarded the Honorary Prize of the Province of Styria in 2024. Her cross-media, feminist, and socially critical approaches revolve around the element of water as a metaphor for change and political and ecological processes.

Slide show Eva Ursprung

Susanne Wenger
Àdùnní Olórìṣà

Slide show

Susanne Wenger gilt als eine zentrale Künstlerin Österreichs nach 1945 und als frühe Wegbereiterin des Surrealismus. Ihr Œuvre, das Skulpturen, Gemälde, Zeichnungen, Drucke und Batiken umfasst, überschreitet ästhetische Kategorien und verbindet Kunst, Spiritualität und Mythos. 

Slide Show Susanne Wenger

Exhibition Tour
Celina Eceiza: Ofrenda

Video

A metabolic force governs the growth of Celina Eceiza’s work, which involves textile collages, sculptures, paintings and drawings — both tiny and colossal in scale — as laborious as they are elementary. The artist combines handcrafted textile techniques and processes such as patchwork, found object collages and, more recently, chalk pastels, which give her images a new sense of fluidity. 

Ausstellungsrundgang Celina Eceiza

Annemarie Arzberger
dreamed awake

Slide show

For HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark the artist has developed her first own performative presentation, with a setting for her puppets with three scenes set in an imaginary spaceship, an exhibition, and the spaces that the scenes depict: the Schlouflaboar, the Houloudecks, and the Space Grotto Disco. The piece is a combination of physical theater and puppetry, performed by the artist together with her sister Katharina Arzberger and accompanied by musical interludes arranged by Manuel Obriejtan.

Slide Show Annemarie Arzberger