Institution — HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark

2023 Program

Following a tender and application process over several stages, Sandro Droschl and the Kunstverein Medienturm were appointed to continue leading HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark for 2023 to 2025 (or 2027). With our successful transformation into an internationally focused art museum, the HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark and team have thus again secured the trust of our supporters, the federal state of Styria, the city of Graz, and at the national level.

Increased expectations are reflected in our ambitious programs, and this is once again the case in 2023. In the light of truly difficult times, with plenty of confusion and complexity, as well as media diversity making it all the more challenging to now define artworks and to present them effectively for a public debate as forms of critical and aesthetic reflection, programming the museum faces additional hurdles. In situations like these, it is often advisable to take a look back and learn lessons from recent history, exploring the present-day relevance of established approaches and forms, and thus in 2023 we will be taking a retrospective perspective on our own time, in order to better understand this from a firmer standpoint.

As part of our quest for relevant contemporary objects and forms, the HALLE FÜR KUNST is presenting a solo show by Heinrich Dunst, Austria’s currently most important conceptual artist. Showing younger and internationally sought-after positions, the dialogic exhibition on affairs responds with an unusual diversity of forms. The show Fantastic Surrealists, by contrast, explores a renewed interest in surrealism and its specific regional history within the context of the fantastic realists, whose relevance today is also impressively questioned in the sculptures and paintings by the Croatian TARWUKgroup. In cooperation with the Art and Exhibition Hall Bonn and Deichtorhallen Hamburg/Sammlung Falkenberg, Graz will also experience the spectacular large-scale exhibition RIDICULOUSLY YOURS! Art, Akwardness and Enthusiasm with the Neue Galerie and HALLE FÜR KUNST working together on this project that begins with works by René Margritte, Georgio de Chirico, and Maria Lassnig, and then moves on to numerous younger positions that react with caustic humor and persistent enthusiasm to often all-too-serious matters. Finally, the custom-made performances PROPAGANDA by Julius Pristauz and MOTORA by Marta Navaridas, Alex Deutinger, and Manuel Riegler will open our exhibition program up to dynamic contemporary forms and aspirations.

Our 2023 program will be accompanied by a rich series of events and education, and by informative online formats and publications, making contemporary art tangible as a marker of our time.

HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark
Photo: kunst-dokumentation.com

Stano Filko, *12 Colors of Reality (Balloons)*, 1978 – 2011
Installation view, HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark, 2022
Courtesy The Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava

*Tempel der Europa*, Graz 2021
Installation view HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark in the frame of the exhibition _Europe: Ancient Future
Photo: kunst-dokumentation.com

Noah Barker,_SFS_GA22, 2023
5 chanel video
0:23 min.
Installation view, HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark, Graz
Courtesy der Künstler; Fanta-MLN, Milan
Photo: kunst-dokumentation.com

History and Mission

In conjunction with the Neue Galerie at the Landesmuseum Joanneum, the house was for decades the site of the legendary Three-Country Biennial Trigon, which was an essential platform for cultural exchange during the Cold War and thus established early links with numerous artists from the South-East European region, such as Marina Abramović/Ulaj, Sanja Ivecović, Mangelos, Gianni Colombo, Luciano Fabro, Luigi Ontani.

In the 1980s, when there was a direct connection between the Graz and Cologne art scenes through Martin Kippenberger and Jörg Schlick, among others, the Pavillion also hosted, for example, a groundbreaking solo exhibition by Albert Oehlen and then later, in the early 2000s, the first Austrian institutional solo exhibition by Cosima von Bonin.

In 2013, the Kunstverein Medienturm, under the artistic direction of Sandro Droschl, finally took over the building, which had previously undergone a general renovation, in order to establish it as an independent institution under the name Künstlerhaus, Halle für Kunst & Medien. The sophisticated and comprehensive program realized in this period can be viewed here: www.km‑k.at.

Under the same leadership but an institutional transformation and reorganization, in 2021 the team was pleased to present the HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark.

Today the exhibition house is dedicated to the presentation of contemporary, socially relevant art production in an international context, whereby the carefully presented art here should also consciously stand and speak for itself. At the same time, attention to local art production has a significant influence on the artistic program. Through these different perspectives, the Kunsthalle (hall of arts) positions itself as a progressive house that cannot think the international outside of the local context and vice versa. Through various formats such as solo and thematic group exhibitions, performances, and residencies, the curatorial team aims to respond directly to the diverse means of expression of today’s artistic production and to be an open place for the resonance of currently relevant discussions.

In doing so, the wonderful architecture and surrounding parkland provide a unique setting for such a program. Facing this physical space, the new website of the HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark is set up as a diversely playable platform that reflects the different focal points and artistic productions and carries them to the outside. Following this step of opening up, it is a great concern of the institution to make contemporary art accessible to all members of society, so that admission to the exhibitions is free and a versatile mediation offer is available.