Where is the body?

Artists: Eero Alev, Ina Ebenberger, Daniel Silva Flandez, Yigit Gönlügür, Loora Kaubi, Jakob Kolb, Olev Kuma, Lisette Lepik, Sigrid Mau, Amar Priganica, Brenda Purtsak, Ramsko, Alfred Rottensteiner, Denisa Stefanigova, Magdalena Schwaiger, Mattias Veller. Curated by Lilian Hiob and Julius Pristauz.

The exhibition brings together a variety of emerging artists, currently studying in the painting departments of the two academies.

Where is the body? gathers assumptions, statements and questions regarding different forms of (self-)embodiment. Questions as to how the body is currently situated in terms of its representation in the students’ practices are central to the curatorial concept of the exhibition. The exhibition presents different depictions and notions of the body in an ever quickly spinning world, opening up space for discussions surrounding it. 

Depictions of fantastical bodies fuse into questions about hierarchies between different species. Loosening up borders, tissues, and deadlocked positions, we find a variety of expressions ranging from more playful approaches to very serious and intense dissections towards the topic. 

Sketches for possible skeletons of the medium of painting and thoughts about material manifestations of bodily gestures within it go alongside introspections and reflections on the anatomy of the self. The artists comment on bodies in use, their capabilities and boundaries, extreme situations and the body as a tool for manipulation and power play. 

The works negotiate body politics and within those relationships of gender, identity and representation. Themes such as deconstruction and decay, performance, dependency and co-dependency can be found as opposed to abstract and hybrid images with transformational potential. From traditional depiction to the changing stance of the body over time the works can help to position and define how and where the body finds a home in young contemporary artists’ practice. 

The display and architecture of the exhibition expand on these ideas further, with its rhizomatic structure making for a spatial experience with different stations. Examining matters connected to belonging, visibility, and desire, Where is the body? helps us to map various narratives that are socially, historically and culturally interwoven and take bodies, in a broader sense, as their starting point.