The Leopold Museum Shows the Drawn & Graphic Works of Hermann Nitsch

Written by Stefan Fellgiebel Sunday, 20 November 2011 21:42

Vienna.- For the first time in Austria, the Leopold Museum will be presenting a museum-based examination of the drawn and graphical oeuvre of Hermann Nitsch. "Hermann Nitsch - Structures" is on view at the museum through January 30th 2012. At the centre of this exhibition will be Hermann Nitsch’s architectural designs, as well as early sketches for monumental compositions influenced by Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka, informal scribbled drawings, sketches from various actions, colour scales for projections, scores for his music and printed graphics. Hermann Nitsch (born 29 August 1938) is an Austrian artist who works in experimental and multimedia modes. Born in Vienna, Nitsch received training in painting during the time he studied at the Wiener Graphische Lehr-und Versuchanstalt.  He is called an "actionist" or a performance artist. He is associated with the Vienna Actionists, and like them conceived his art outside traditional categories of genre. Nitsch's abstract splatter paintings, like his performance pieces, established a theme of controlled violence, using bright reds, maroons, and pale greys that communicate organic mutilation.

In the 1950s, Nitsch conceived of the Orgien Mysterien Theater (which roughly translates as "Theatre of Orgies and Mysteries" or "The Orgiastic Mystery Theater"), staging nearly 100 performances between 1962 and 1998. Nitsch's work, which can be considered both ritualistic and existential, first drew attention in the early 1960s when he exhibited a skinned and mutilated lamb. The lamb was crucified against a white fabric-covered wall, with the entrails removed and displayed below a white table, splashed with blood and hot water. This was accompanied by Nitsch's "Geräuschmusik". Nitsch's subsequent work has incorporated many similar elements, often combining slaughtered animals, red fruits, music, dancing, and active participants. Nitsch juxtaposed slaughtered animal intestines with quasi-religious icons such as staged crucifixions, satirizing and questioning the moral ethics of atavistic religion and sacrifice. Currently his work is often discussed in the context of our culture's fixation with violence seen on the news, movie screens, and in popular video games. Correlations have also been drawn to many instances of the intersection of violence and culture.


These performance works, which have become known as "actions" have become more and more elaborate over the years. This highly elaborate work is exemplified by the 6-Day Play, which Nitsch considered to be his pinnacle piece. In 1998, Nitsch staged his 100th performance (named the 6-Day Play after its length) which took place at his castle in Austria, Schloss Prinzendorf. In 2004, he held an abbreviated (2-day) version of the work. By 1995 Nitsch had been so sufficiently embraced by the establishment, that the Vienna State Opera invited him to direct and design the sets and costumes for Jules Massenet's opera Hérodiade. Nitsch continues to publish articles and release CDs. In 2009 Nitsch was the central guest of the Incubate festival in Tilburg, Netherlands. In May 2010 Nitsch held his 130th Action in Naples, Italy at the Museo Nitsch (Morra Foundation). A 12 hour long piece, this was Nitsch's first performance in Naples since 1996, and also first using the new museum facility dedicated to his work. The action proceeded from the museum, with a full procession through the streets, to the San Martino Vineyard overlooking the city and the Bay of Naples. The action coincided with the Nitsch/ Caravaggio show at the Pio Monte della Misericordia, where Caravaggio's "Seven Works of Mercy" is held. On February 15th and 16th, Nitsch held his first ever live painting action (60th Malaktion)in the United States at the Mike Weiss Gallery in New York City.

The Leopold Museum is a unique and active museum awash with light in the heart of Vienna and the biggest cultural magnet in the MuseumsQuartier. Besides exciting special exhibitions, it not only houses the most substantial and most important collection of Egon Schiele worldwide but also priceless masterpieces by Gustav Klimt, including what is probably most important figurative painting “Death and Life”. In no other museum in Vienna one can get so close to the fabled “Fin de siècle Vienna” and witness the birth of Modernity. The collection shows how the art of the Habsburg Empire changed from strict Historicism and romantic impressionism within a few years to the unique “Wiener Moderne” which encompasses Klimt and Schiele as well as Oskar Kokoschka, Richard Gerstl, Koloman Moser and many other artists who are all well represented with major works at the Leopold Museum. A further focus of the museum is on the Austrian interwar period, which brought out many important artists like Albin Egger-Lienz, Anton Kolig and Herbert Boeckl and partly points in the direction of the second half of the twentieth century. This is why Austrian artists of the post war generation or exceptional works of the nineteenth century by Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller, Friedrich Gauermann, August von Pettenkofen, Anton Romako, Emil Jakob Schindler, Carl Schuch and others are repeatedly presented. Substantial and amazingly modernly designed into the everyday objects of the Fin de Siècle round up the collection, especially works by Otto Wagner, Adolf Loos, Dagobert Peche and the founders of the Wiener Werkstätte Josef Hoffmann and Koloman Moser all of whom can be seen in the museum. And since all the great artists of the Wiener Moderne met on a regular basis in the epochal coffee houses for inspiring exchanges, it goes without saying that the Leopold Museum also has a coffee house. Visit the museum's website at ... http://www.leopoldmuseum.org

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