The European Dream
Rose-Anne Gush
Video
Please note that this video is available in English.
The European Dream is a collaboratively written reading performance developed by Rose-Anne Gush and her students at the Institute of Contemporary Art at TU Graz.
The performance is meant to be an artistic tool to explore the question of the ideological forces that shape Europe today. What kind of society do we live in and how can the different positions of speakers even be thought together? Ideology exists in many forms and contains beliefs, images and values that can never be considered as final and naturally given, but always tend to be presented as universal, though.
While the postmodern turn was proclaimed with the end of the 1980s and the view spread that values such as ambiguity, polyphony and difference were about to become social guiding principles, the situation now seems to have changed dramatically. For some time now, a revival of major ideological narratives has been observable, narratives that offer simple solutions to complex questions. Considering old social inequalities rearising and the ongoing political rejections, a critical examination of social ideologies seems urgently needed.
Participants of the Performance:
Nicole Antunovic, Gagandeep Bhatti, Rose-Anne Gush, Elsa Karvanen, Budour Khalil, Alena Viola Köstl, Anastasiia Kutsova, Abdelrahman Elbashir, Farnoosh Namaziyan, Sali Ren, Ana Patrícia Silva Varão Moreira. Support by Christina Chalmers and Federico Campagna.
Rose-Anne Gush is Assistant-Professor at the Institute of Contemporary Art at TU Graz. Her research interest includes among others theories of Global Art, spatial politics, the spatial politics of capitalism and form, and the relationships between colonialism, fascism and capitalism. Her research and teaching are oriented towards anti-racist, feminist, and emancipatory horizons. Gush’s first book length project (in progress), Artistic Labour of the Body builds on her PhD, exploring the place, use of, and meaning of the body in postwar art and literature in relation to Theodor W. Adorno’s aesthetics. Gush’s research is published in Kunst und Politik: Jahrbuch der Guernica-Gesellschaft (2020), Third Text (2019), Performance Research (2018), Objects of Feminism (Helsinki, 2017) and AWARE (2017).
More contributions
Michael Krebber in conversation with Sandro Droschl
Video
As part of the exhibition A.rtificial I.ntrospection O., Michael Krebber speaks with Sandro Droschl about his artistic practice and his engagement with the writings and conceptual models of Oswald Wiener.
Michael Krebber in conversation with Sandro Droschl A.rtificial I.ntrospection O.
Exhibition Tour
Slide show
The exhibition A.rtificial I.ntrospection O. (A.I.O.) explores questions of thought, perception, and subjectivity at the intersection of introspection, cybernetics, and artificial intelligence. Its point of departure is the work of the Austrian writer, cognitive psychologist, and cybernetician Oswald Wiener (1935 – 2021), whose genuine thinking since the 1950s critically navigated between these fields while systematically resisting institutional appropriation.
Slide Show A.rtificial I.ntrospection O. Dr. Brigitte Borchhardt-Birbaumer
Susanne Wenger’s painting between Africa and Europe
Video
In her lecture, art historian and curator Brigitte Borchhardt-Birbaumer examines Susanne Wenger’s work as a transcultural Gesamtkunstwerk that bridges European modernism and Yorùbá ritual practice, creating a new sacred aesthetic that merges art, ritual, and cultural boundaries.
Brigitte Borchardt 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 Xol Meissner
Concert
Video
New York-based artist Xol Meissner — the alter ego of composer Mauro Hertig — has transformed the HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark into a hypnotic soundscape of extraordinary intensity with his haunting music, which oscillates between contemporary classical and avant-garde rock.
Xol Meissner 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
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