Erkan Özgen, Wonderland (Video still), 2016.
Guillaume Courtois, The boold of Christ, after Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 17th century.
Jan de Beer, The martyrdom of St. Sebastian, ca. 1510/15.
Images of suffering and pain are omnipresent. Not just in mass media, but also in art. Mental and physical wounds are just as much a part of life as the attempt to cope with these injuries and to include them positively in one's own biography.
The exhibition focuses on artistic representations of physical, psychological, and sociopolitical wounds against the backdrop of a Christian pictorial tradition. The works shown span the Middle Ages to modern and contemporary art, exposing very different approaches to the subject of wounds, such as the vulnerability of the artists' own bodies or the slicing of the canvas.
Artists: Kader Attia, Jan de Beer, Renate Bertlmann, Joseph Beuys, Louise Bourgeois, Léa Le Bricomte, Günter Brus, Heinz Cibulka, Guillaume Courtois, Lucas Cranach, Ricardo Cuevas, Raphael Dallaporta, Katrina Daschner, Manfred Erjautz, VALIE EXPORT, Lucio Fontana, Joseph von Führich, Giovanni Giuliani, Birgit Jürgennsen, Lamia Joreige, Anders Krisár, Iris Legendre, Meister des Albrechtsaltars, Meister des Winkler-Epitaphs, Nadia Myre, Hermann Nitsch, Erkan Özgen, ORLAN, Gina Pane, Hannes Priesch, Markus Prachensky, Sophie Ristelhueber, Gabriele Rothemann, Gerhard Rühm, Romain Sarrot, Anneliese Schrenk, Andres Serrano, Shozo Shimamoto, Hana Usui, Tanzio de Varallo, and others.
Available for purchase in the museum shop.
Throughout many eras, the wound has been a focus of artistic expression committed to existential concerns. The exhibition focuses on artistic representations of wounds against the backdrop of a Christian pictorial tradition. The works shown span the Middle Ages to modern and contemporary art.
The objects in the exhibition are culled from international loans and from the museum's own diverse holdings, which include the historic objects from St. Stephen's Cathedral to the Otto Mauer Contemporary Collection. The richly illustrated catalogue covers the six thematic segments of the show, and includes exhibition views as well as in-depth essays.