Viennese Actionism

Otto Mühl, Materialaktion 8: Stilleben – Aktion mit einem weiblichen Kopf und einem Schweinekopf, 1964. Photographs taken by Ludwig Hoffenreich. [1]

Günter Brus, Wiener Spaziergang, 1965/1989. B&W photograph taken by Ludwig Hoffenreich. 40 x 40 cm. Joanneum.

Valie Export, Peter Weibel, Aus der Mappe der Hundigkeit, 1968/2003. B&W photograph taken by Josef Tandl. 40.3 x 50.3 cm. Generali.

Export, Weibel (eds.), Wien: Bildkompendium Wiener Aktionismus und Film, 1970.

Works

• on UbuWeb

Publications

• Nitsch, Mühl, Frohner, Manifest die Blutorgel, Vienna, 1962, [4] pp. (German)

• Valie Export, Peter Weibel (eds.), Wien: Bildkompendium Wiener Aktionismus und Film, Frankfurt: Kohlkunstverlag, 1970. Includes texts by Hermann Nitsch, Otto Mühl, Günter Brus, Rudolf Schwartzkogler, and others. Contains an invaluable chronology and extensive black-and-white photographs, assembled by the second-generation Viennese Actionists Valie Export and Peter Weibel. Known as "The Black Book", this publication had more influence on subsequent body and performance art than any other precursor to the medium. Excerpts. [2] (German)

• Brus, Muehl, Nitsch, Schwarzkogler: Writings of the Vienna Actionists, ed. & trans. Malcolm Green, London: Atlas Press, 1999, 257 pp, ARG.

Catalogues

• Viennese Actionism: Günter Brus, Otto Muehl, Hermann Nitsch, Rudolf Schwarzkogler, Sevilla: Junta de Andalucía, Consejería de Cultura, 2008, 439 pp. TOC.

• Rite of Passage: The Early Years of Vienna actionism 1960-1966: Günter Brus, Hermann Nitsch, Otto Muehl, Rudolf Schwarzkogler, ed. Hubert Klocker, Cologne: Snoeck, 2014, 115 pp. TOC.

Literature

• Robert Fleck, Avant-garde in Wien: Die Geschichte der Galerie nächst St. Stephan, 1954-1982; Kunst und Kunstbetrieb in Österreich, Vienna: Löcker, 1982. Beginning with the café society of post-fascist Vienna, Fleck situates the opening of the Galerie nächst St. Stephan in 1954 as foundational for the development of experimental art in Austria. The gallery exhibited such artists as Arnulf Rainer, Markus Prachesky, and Georges Mathieu, whose 1957 painting demonstration inspired the work of the Viennese Action artists, according to Fleck. The book ends with the return of painting in the 1980s. (German)

• Von der Aktionsmalerei zum Aktionismus: Wien 1960-1965 / From Action Painting to Actionism: Vienna 1960-1965, eds. Museum Fridericianum, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, and Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Klagenfurt: Ritter, 1988, 357 pp. Volume 1 of a singularly informative pair of early publications on Viennese Actionism (see also Volume 2, Klocker 1989) with a 300-page detailed chronology and bibliography by Dieter Schwarz. Essays by Veit Loers, Richard Calvocoressi, Peter Noever, and Keith Hartley; filmography by Schwarz and Peter Kasperak. Also features many historic photographs. Exh. held at Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Winterthur, 24 Sep-13 Nov 1988; Museum Fridericianum, Kassel, 12 Jun-4 Sep 1988; Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, 17 Dec 1988-5 Feb 1989; Österreichisches Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna, 16 Mar-15 May 1989. (German)/(English)

• Wiener Aktionismus: Wien 1960-1971: Der Zertrümmerte Spiegel / Viennese Actionism: Vienna 1960-1971: The Shattered Mirror, ed. Hubert Klocker, trans. Alfred M. Fisher, Klagenfurt: Ritter, 1989, 392 pp. Essays by Klocker and Konrad Oberhuber, an excellent bibliography by year (beginning in 1960), and chronological biographies of the four original artists: Günter Brus, Otto Mühl, Hermann Nitsch, and Rudolf Schwarzkogler. Also contains documentary photographs. Exh. held at Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna, Mar-Apr 1989; Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Aug-Sep 1989. (German)/(English)

• texts by Arnulf and Franziska Meifert, 1997-2007. (German)

• Thomas Dreher, "Wiener Aktionismus", ch 2.5 in Dreher, Performance Art nach 1945: Aktionstheater und Intermedia, Munich: Fink, 2001, pp 163-298. (German)

• Oliver Jahraus, Die Aktion des Wiener Aktionismus. Subversion der Kultur und Dispositionierung des Bewußtseins, Munich: Fink, 2001, 505 pp. (German)

• Stephen Barber, The Art of Destruction: The Films of the Vienna Action Group, Creation Books, 2004, 148 pp. Documents and explores the aesthetical, social, and political contexts of the films made by Viennese action artists (especially Otto Mühl), as well as films the group made in collaboration with Kurt Kren, the Austrian structuralist filmmaker, and others. Viennese action artists’ films are considered documents of the artists’ performances and works of filmic art. (English)

• "1962b: Viennese Actionism", in Art Since 1900, eds. Hal Foster, et al., London: Thames & Hudson, 2004, pp 464-469. (English)

• Vienna Actionism: Art and Upheaval in 1960s' Vienna, eds. Eva Badura-Triska, Hubert Klocker, and Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Cologne: Buchhandlung Walther König, 2012, 416 pp. Reconsiders the contextual history and emergence of Viennese Action Art and its transgressive role in the history of performance art internationally. Also includes discussion of the literary cabaret of the Wiener Gruppe (Friedrich Achleitner, Konrad Bayer, Gerhard Rühm, Oswald Wiener) that anticipated Viennese Actionism, and examines second generation artists like Valie Export and Peter Weibel. Biographies, lavish illustrations, illustrated chronology, and an index of performances, films, and literature. [3] (English)

• Mechtild Widrich, "The Informative Public of Performance. A Study of Viennese Actionism", TDR. The Drama Review 57:1, Feb 2013, pp 137-151. (English)

• Susan Jarosi, "Traumatic Subjectivity and the Continuum of History: Hermann Nitsch’s Orgies Mysteries Theater", Art History 36:4, Sep 2013, pp 834-863. A case study of trauma in Nitsch’s work as a model for considering the visualization, enactment, and embodiment of traumatic experience across artistic production and in the histories of art.

• Thomas Dreher, "Wiener Aktionismus und Aktionstheater in München", IASL online, 2015. (German)

• Caroline Lillian Schopp, "On Failing to Perform: Kunst und Revolution, Vienna 1968", October 170, Fall 2019, pp 95-119. (English)

Encyclopedic entries

en Oxford DMCA, Tate, Wikipedia. fr Larousse. es Akal. cr Šuvaković. hu Artportal.

Recent events

• Body, Psyche, and Taboo: Vienna Actionism & Early Vienna Modernism exhibition, Mumok, Vienna, Mar-May 2016.