we would like to welcome you all to the start of the 2024 summer semester. We have good news to begin the semester with! This includes personnel news, we are delighted that Alastair Mackinven and Emily Wardill, will be in charge of the studios of Art and Image | Figuration and Art and Time | Film at the Institute for Fine Arts, while Andrea Faraguna will be teaching Architectural Design at the Institute for Art and Architecture for two semesters. We also welcome all new members of staff who are starting to work at the Academy!
In the area of support for emerging artists and graduates, we have created new programs that open up further opportunities for our students. This year, for example, we will be able to send a total of four graduates to Genalguacil, an artist village in Andalusia, as part of a new artist-in-residence program. In addition to the existing prizes such as the Cathrin Pichler Prize, Brigit Jürgenssen Prize, Kunsthalle Wien Prize and many more, you will find new calls for entries on our submission platform in spring. This week, the application deadline is March 7 for the Irmgard Lettner and Ernst Lemberger scholarship for supporting final degrees, and you will also find current calls from the Art School Alliance, Erasmus+ and Worldwide Exchange and associated opportunities for stays abroad (USA, UK, Ghana, China, etc.) as well as other opportunities for prizes, scholarships, and grants as always on the Academy website and on our submission system.
This year’s main theme of Academy | Art | Public Sphere will be Art and Democracy. We will be expanding our cooperation with other art institutions in order to launch a joint campaign. We are developing an artistic concept, with which we will express fundamental positions on topics of gender, migration, care work, social inequality, etc. through various channels. More information will follow soon - we are looking forward to your participation.
We would like to congratulate Dubravka Jembrih-Simbürger (INTK) on the OeAD funding approval for her project "Identification, Stability and Ageing Phenomena of Colorants used in Modern Inks in Archive Documents, Prints, Caricatures and other Written Heritage Objects", Helena Schmidt (PostDoc, IKL) for the Award of Excellence 2023 from the BMBWF for her dissertation "Poor image to poor images. Digital didactics in art education", IBK-graduate Lisa Rastl for the Elfriede Mejchar Prize for Photography and Sophia Roxane Rohwetter (student of Master in Critical Studies) for the AICA Prize for Young Art Criticism. Congratulations!
The contest procedure for the building for the Centre for Material Science in Art and Conservation at the Arsenal has been successfully completed. The submissions - and the winner project – will be presented in the Auditorium (Aula) at Schillerplatz from April 5.
We would also like to draw your attention to the History Tales exhibition in the Paintings Gallery, which is on display until May 26. The exhibition and educational project Soundscapes of Intersectional Encounters: Exploring Identity Through Sound will open in the Exhibit Gallery on Thursday, March 14. Admission to the Exhibit is generally for free. Students, staff of the Academy and their company have free admission to the Paintings Gallery.
We wish you all a good start into the new semester!