The Austrian Cultural Forum Moscow (ACF Moscow) sees itself as a cooperation partner and contact point for Austrian artists, cultural institutions and scientists for the initiation, planning and implementation of Austro-Russian cultural and scientific projects.

"Lydia Masterkova. An Enriched Retrospective"

The first retrospective exhibition in Russia of the nonconformist artist Lydia Masterkova (1927–2008) will bring together around 150 paintings and works on paper from private and museum collections in Russia and France. 

Lydia Masterkova was among the first female artists to turn to abstract art after 1953. This is the first exhibition at Garage that is almost entirely devoted to abstraction, although it will feature some figurative works. Masterkova’s retrospective will be contextually enriched with other visions of abstract art. 

Austrian artist Heimo Zobernig (b. 1958) will show works that demonstrate the alternative reality of the situation in Central Europe as opposed to the Soviet Union. There, after a short period of persecution in Nazi Germany and Austria, abstract art was completely rehabilitated and became an object of profound research, conceptual polemics, and jests. Zobernig’s tactile canvases exist somewhere between a joke and a conceptual rethinking of the relationship between the viewer and the artwork.

The exhibition is divided into eight parts. Five cover the evolution of Masterkova’s creative method. "Thicket" features her early studies from nature and first experiments in abstraction that bring to mind Mikhail Matiushin’s “organic culture” and his concept of “seeing-and-knowing” (Zorved). "Lacunae" explores the work of Efrosinya Ermilova-Platova, who Masterkova met before turning to abstraction. "Ruptures" presents the beginning of Masterkova’s mature period, when her focus shifted from vegetal form to textures and spatial plans within the painting. "Gold" looks at the short period when Masterkova made trips to abandoned churches, where she collected fragments of church attire to include in her collage paintings. In "Spheres and Numbers", the key themes of the mature painter find their final shape, and the cosmic sequence of numbers, rhythmic patterns, and circles becomes the main compositional principle. "Macrocosm" consists of works that Masterkova made after her emigration to Europe in 1975, a more precise and minimalist version of her earlier structures.

Separate galleries are given over to the "Rembrandt Series" by Eva Levina-Rozengolts, in which the artist revisits the humanitarian disasters of the Great Purge and the war, and three works by Heimo Zobernig, produced for the exhibition. 

Zobernig also created the architectural concept. As the visitor progresses through the galleries, the walls lose their color and textural intensity. The first galleries feature elements of set design from several theaters in Moscow and St. Petersburg and toward the end the space is cleared of color. This gradient reflects the internal and external transformation of Masterkova’s art: from apartment exhibitions and close interactions with the environment to the strict autonomy of the white cube gallery and museum spaces.

CURATORS: VALENTIN DIACONOV AND SASHA OBUKHOVA

As part of the exhibition dedicated to the development of  abstraction by the Russian artist Lydia Masterkova, Heimo Zobernig  was invited to create an architectural situation and a dialogue  between the Russian and Western branches of abstraction. The exhibition will feature new works by the artist from theatrical  platforms and blankets based on the "Chess painting" series, with  which the visitor will be able to interact, gaining a tactile experience.  As a spatial solution, according to Zobernig's idea, the architecture  of the exhibition will be assembled from the theatrical scenery found.

Heimo Zobernig work and the architectural concept of the exhibition "Lydia Masterkova. An Enriched Retrospective" in Garage Museum

The retrospective "The Best Cinema of Austria" takes place as part of the Austrian program of the 4th Festival of German speaking countries in Saint Petersburg DACH_FEST (February 28 - March 20, 2022). It is dedicated to the 10th anniversary of the Austrian Film Award, which first given out in 2011. The retrospective introduces the audience of the DACH_FEST 2022 to the diverse range of contemporary Austrian cinema over the past 10 years. A program of 6 films will be presented to the St. Petersburg audience. Lectures by film critics on contemporary Austrian directors and films are planned as part of the film screenings.

All films are shown in their original language with Russian subtitles. Admission to all screenings is free.

March 9 (Wednesday) 19:00 - "Breathing", 2011 Austrian art house drama film written and directed by Karl Markovics, 93 min., 18+

The film concerns a 19-year-old inmate in a detention facility for juveniles, with a pending application for parole, who is challenged to reconsider his identity by a trial work-release job at a morgue. Starring Thomas Schubert, Karin Lischka and Gerhard Liebmann, it was screened at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. Schubert won Best Actor at the 17th Sarajevo Film Festival for his performance, presented to him by Angelina Jolie. The film was selected as Austria's submission to the 84th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, but it did not make the final shortlist.

18:30 - Lecture: "Ulrich Seidl - an Austrian film provocateur". 16+ Lecturer: Ksenia Reutova - journalist, film critic, curator 

19:00 - "Paradise: Love", 2012 drama film directed by Ulrich Seidl, 120 min., 18+

It tells the story of a 50-year-old white woman who travels to Kenya as a sex tourist. The project is an Austrian production with co-producers in Germany and France. It is the first installment in Seidl's Paradise trilogy, a project first conceived as one film with three parallel stories. Paradise: Love competed at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. It subsequently screened within such festivals as Toronto International Film Festival, Maryland Film Festival and New Zealand International Film Festival.

March 11 (Friday) 17:00 - "Deine Schönheit ist nichts wert", 2012 directed by Hüseyin Tabak, 86 min., 12+

When 12 year old boy Veysel falls in love for the first time he decides to express his feelings by reciting a poem to his beloved in front of the class. But in order to do so he first needs to translate the lyrics into German.

March 11 (Friday) 19:00 - "The Dark Valley", 2014 Austrian-German Western drama film directed by Andreas Prochaska, based on Thomas Willmann's sole eponymous 2010 novel. 115 min., 16+

The film stars Sam Riley as a lone traveler who ends up in a small town in the Alps, finding corruption and tyranny running rampant. It was selected as the Austrian entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 87th Academy Awards, but was not nominated.

March 12 (Saturday) 16:30 - "Murer: Anatomy of a Trial", 2018, directed by Christian Frosch, 137 min., 16+

The prestigious politician and large-scale farmer Franz Murer, responsible for the Ghetto of Vilnius as SS leader and NSDAP functionary from 1941-1943, stands trial in Graz, Austria. Survivors of the mass murder arrive to testify and obtain justice: to no avail.

March 12 (Saturday) 19:00 - "The Trouble with Being Born", 2020 science fiction drama film directed and co-written by Sandra Wollner, 94 min., 18+ 

An international co-production of Austria and Germany, the film stars Lena Watson as an android built by a father (Dominik Warta) as a replicant in place of his young daughter who had disappeared years prior. On its premier at the 70th Berlin International Film Festival, the film garnered controversy for its depiction of a relationship between a man and a minor, albeit an android, that also resembles his child.

4th Festival of German speaking countries in St. Petersburg DACH_FEST 2022

Mascha Dabić reads from her novel "Reibungsverluste" at the Austrian Library in Moscow. Furthermore, it will be possible for the audience to ask questions about the novel and about working with refugees.

Mascha Dabić deals with the issue of migration as a journalist, works as an interpreter in the asylum and conference sector and also teaches at the universities of Vienna and Innsbruck.

In the novel "Reibungsverluste" the protagonist works as an interpreter in a therapy center for traumatized refugees. We accompany her in her work for one day; wake up is the title of the first chapter, fall asleep of the last. At the end of the day, we are smarter, more observant, and more understanding.

We look forward to seeing you!
Registration is required: oesterreich-bibl@mail.ru
Also when participating online for receiving the link via ZOOM!

Date: February 22 2022, 6 pm - 7:30 pm

Partners:
Österreich Bibliothek Moskau
Österreich Bibliothek Nischnij Novgorod
Moskauer State University

book presentation “Reibungsverluste” by Mascha Dabić
moderation: Hanna Daliot

book presentation “Reibungsverluste” by Mascha Dabić

The symposium is held as a part of a public educational program of the exhibition «New Elements» and aims to bring to the forefront the current issues of new artistic practices that redefines the relationship between digital and analogue computational processes and systems.

The symposium has two main objectives. The first concerns institutional practices. Together with colleagues from leading institutions in the field, we will try to define the boundaries of what science-art is today, to discuss recent trends and principles and to see where it could head in the future. The second aim is to discuss the exhibition «New Elements», which is currently taking place in the West Wing of the New Tretyakov Gallery, and reflect on the artworks presented.

The symposium program ends with a spectacular performance by the German artist Ralf Baecker: «The Natural History of Networks / SoftMachine».

Cultural and Education Sector of the British Embassy in Moscow within the international program UK – Russia Creative Bridge 2021-2022

Symposium "New Elements"

The coronavirus pandemic turned the museum world upside down. During the strict lockdowns, galleries and museums closed for months, and the only way to stay connected to their audiences was to launch online projects. Although museums have returned to their usual routine, albeit with limitations, digital products are not going anywhere. In fact, they are gaining momentum with each passing day.

Strelka Mag and the Austrian Cultural Forum in Moscow spoke with the directors and representatives of eight museums—four in Moscow and four in Vienna—to learn how they are handling these challenges and why people should still go to museums, even in the digital age.

STRELKA MAG
Belvedere Museum
Albertina Museum
Leopold Museum
Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM)
Pushkin States Museum of Fine Arts
State Tretyakov Gallery
Multimedia Art Museum Moscow
Moscow Museum of Modern Art

Digital Museum. Museums during lockdown in Moscow and Vienna

The exhibition NEW ELEMENTS explores an unusual perspective on data and computation, centering on the physicality of information and its implications for how we make sense of the world. 12 works by artists from different countries show how to close the gap between data and the world.

Organizers:
Laboratoria Art&Science Foundation
State Tretyakov Gallery

Curators:
Daria Parkhomenko (Russia)
Dietmar Offenhuber (Austria / USA)

Artists:
Memo Akten (Turkey – UK)
Ralf Baecker (Germany)
Erich Berger (Finland)
Ilya Fedotov-Fedorov (Russia)
Thomas Feuerstein (Austria)
Forensic Architecture (UK)
Ryoichi Kurokawa (Japan)
Tuula Narhinen (Finland)
Anna Ridler (UK)
Tomas Saraceno (Argentina)
Theresa Schubert (Germany)
AKI INOMATA (Japan)

New Elements

Since 1997 the Cultural Department of the City of Graz is awarding the literary scholarship "Grazer Stadtschreiber:in" on the basis of a city council resolution.

In the sense of a literary - cultural exchange as well as the very consciously promoted contact with the Graz literary scene, the city of Graz provides the scholarship holder/scholarship holder:in with an apartment in the Cerrini-Schlössl on the Schlossberg in Graz free of charge from September, 2022 to August, 2023 as part of this annual stay.

Deadline: 31.3.2022

The call for applications "Grazer Stadtschreiber:in" is only open to writers (prose, poetry, theater)!
All papers have to be sent as PDF! Other formats will not be accepted!

For further information please see: http://www.kultur.graz.at/kulturamt/33
The following links lead to the application guidelines in German and English.
http://www.kultur.graz.at/pdfs/richtlinie_stadtschreiber_2022.pdf
http://www.kultur.graz.at/pdfs/guidelines_stadtschreiber_2021.pdf


For your questions please contact:
Konrad Stachl
Cultural Office of the City of Graz
Stigergasse 2 (Mariahilfer Platz), 2nd floor, A-8020 Graz
Phone: +43/316/872-4924
fax: +43/316/872-4909
e-mail:konrad.stachl@stadt.graz.at

Open Call for applications for the LITERATURE SCHOLARSHIP "Grazer Stadtschreiber:in"

Austrian publicist and translator Erich Klein, winner of the Austrian State Prize of literary criticism, will take part in the regional scientific conference - the anniversary "XXV Chekhov Readings", which will be held on January 28, 2022 at the Literary and Art Museum of A. P. Chekhov's book "Sakhalin Island" and the Sakhalin International Theater Center named after A.P. Chekhov. The conference includes plenary and breakout sessions, which will also be held online. Mr. Klein will speak in the philological section with a report "Why Franz Kafka, the author of the "Penal Colony", always laughed when he read Chekhov." 

On January 29, Mr. Klein will visit the Sakhalin State Universal Scientific Library, where he will meet the director of the SakhOUNB Malysheva Valentina Avramovna, with the "Austrian corner" at the Library and give a lecture for students of Sakhalin State University and residents of the city - "Paul Celan goes to the cinema and watches "Battleship Potemkin" by Sergei Eisenstein. On political engagement in poetry".

And finally, on February 4, Erich Klein will repeat his lecture related to the works of the poet Paul Celan at the Library for Foreign Literature named after M.I. Rudomino in Moscow.

https://libfl.ru/ru/event/vstrecha-s-erihom-klyaynom

https://global-libfl.timepad.ru/event/1910525/

Participation of the Austrian publicist and translator Erich Klein at the XXV Chekhov Readings, as well as lectures about the works of the poet Paul Celan at the Sakhalin State Universal Scientific Library and The Library for Foreign Literature named after M.I. Rudomino

What is it that makes authors world authors? What are the ideas and stories that fascinate people all over the world? How do they change across borders?

Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) is still one of the most widely read German-speaking authors today. Thomas Mann wrote about his world-famous fellow-writer: “His literary fame extended to the far corners of the globe.” Zweig’s enduring appeal is demonstrated by the many historical and contemporary film adaptations, reworkings and translations of his texts, from Europe to China.

This phenomenon is the subject of the new special exhibition at the Literature Museum of the Austrian National Library. It shows Zweig as a not uncontroversial best-selling author and as a citizen of the world, undertaking extensive journeys across Europe to America, Russia and India, and living in exile in Brazil after being expelled by the Nazis. Using original manuscripts, letters, photographs, film clips and sound recordings, the show takes us around the globe (“Magellan”), to Indonesia (“Amok”) and Brazil (“Brazil: Land of the Future”), as well as into the “World of Yesterday” of the lost Habsburg Empire, which Zweig saw as a global model for the coexistence of different peoples. As a pioneering thinker of Europe, he strove for a literature that transcends the borders of individual nations.

The exhibition has been created in collaboration with the Stefan Zweig Centre Salzburg and the Literature Archive Salzburg.

Video of the exhibition was made by Cultural section of the Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs in cooperation with the Literature Museum of the Austrian National Library:

Stefan Zweig - Weltautor

Video of the exhibition in cooperation with the Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs

Stefan Zweig. World Author (Video of the exhibition in the Literature Museum of the Austrian National Library)

The Moscow International Biennale for Young Art is one of the largest projects on the Russian contemporary art scene held since 2008. From July to September 2022 Moscow will host its 8th edition. The Main Project will take place at the building of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art located at 25 Petrovka Street. 

Applications to take part in the Main Project of the 8th Moscow International Biennale for Young Art, which is to be held in August-September 2022, can be submitted through 18 January 2022 at the biennale’s website youngart.ru.

Any curator under 35 years, whose project includes works by artists and art groups belonging to the same age category, can apply for the open call. Applications from the groups of curators are also accepted; collective and individual applications are considered equal. Questions regarding the application process can be sent to info@youngart.ru.

Results of the open call will be announced on 25 February 2022. 

Open call for curators to take part in the Main Project of the Moscow International Biennale for Young Art

The exhibition Xenia Hausner: True Lies will open on 28 September at the Gallery of 19th and 20th Century European and American Art at The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts. Visitors will get to see a total of 30 paintings by Xenia Hausner and a series of photographs made by the artist in preparation for her painted works.

Xenia Hausner was born into an artist’s family in 1950, studied stage design in Vienna and London, and began creating set designs for plays and operas in 1977, working with the most prestigious venues in the world from the Royal Opera House Covent Garden to the Salzburg Festival.

In 1992, the artist decided to devote herself exclusively to painting. This was motivated by her desire to gain more freedom and become the ‘director of her own painterly productions’. The theatrical and, more generally, narrative dimension of Hausner’s work shows her to be the inheritor of a centuries-long tradition of Western European painting. At the same time, her art is targeted at the present day, depicting contemporary character types and treating current societal problems. Her dramatic, colourful and emotionally charged works leave no one indifferent, convincingly showing that the potential of figurative painting is far from exhausted today.

In most of Hausner’s paintings, the action takes place in a theatrical setting with meticulous staging, arranged lighting, and decorative backdrops, where models play out roles in mysterious and ambiguous mise-en-scènes. The very title of the exhibition points to the importance of theatrical principles in the artist’s work: the arranged, the invented and the fictitious turn out to have a truthful inner content that evokes the viewer’s immediate reaction.

In Xenia Hausner’s work, everything is designed to intensify the viewer’s experience – a task previously pursued by several generations of 20th-century painters. The artist attains this goal thanks to her vivid palette, sweeping brushstrokes, ornamental motifs and decorative designs, which are further enhanced by large formats and powerful and monumental figures that place her work in the tradition of altarpieces, historical paintings and state portraits.

One of Xenia Hausner’s key themes is the role of women in life and art. The action of her paintings takes place in a certain alternate reality dominated by women, who play the main role in the artist’s settings. Far from imposing themselves, the rare male characters blend organically into the ‘female world’ of her paintings.

‘My universe is female. Women are a pivotal element in my work. In my pictures they act as representatives of all genders. I process the human themes with a female cast.’ Xenia Hausner

Hausner’s paintings are capable of generating ever new meanings in the individual viewing experience. The artist also expands the associative field through her use of titles from both well-known and relatively obscure films and books, which provide additional food for thought for viewers in the know. More often than not, the plots and characters of these works bear little relation to what is taking place in the artist’s paintings. Hausner makes use of the method of free association when choosing her titles that are, first and foremost, poetic metaphors. In addition, she often refers to both individual works by other artists and general styles of painting. In any case, reading a specific reference does not provide the viewer with an instant solution but only helps him or her to find one of many possible vectors of interpretation.

‘I don’t offer an instruction manual or reading guide. On the contrary. Unambiguous interpretations are boring. Life is a question mark. Art has to be mysterious, nonconformist, and irrational.’ Xenia Hausner

The desire to find a connection with the viewer, to be open to him or her, is the most important aspect of Xenia Hausner's work. At the same time, the ambivalence of many of the scenes staged by the artist makes the viewer take an active stance with regard to her paintings and compare them with his or her own life experiences, fears and desires.

Hausner’s art has a profound impact at both visual and emotional levels: the viewer is caught up in the drama of an intense and, at the same time, highly intimate and profound contact between human beings. The artist has a special gift for bringing across subtly orchestrated emotional links between the main characters of her paintings, whose main themes are human relations and manifestations of care, affection and love. This explains the profound importance of her work for today’s world marked by an unending pandemic, continuing local and global conflicts, and the appearance of ever new waves of refugees.

Curators: Daniel Bulatov and Elsy Lahner (Vienna)

Xenia Hausner’s retrospective is held in cooperation with The Albertina Museum Vienna and with the support of the Austrian Federal Ministry for Arts, Culture, Civil Service and Sport as well as of the Austrian Cultural Forum Moscow and Austrian Embassy in Russia.

The exhibition of the Austrian painter and stage designer Xenia Hausner "True lies", which was earlier presented in the Albertina museem, will be shown in the State Museum of Fine Arts A. S. Pushkin. Around the exhibition are planned different educational events.

Events

Heimo Zobernig work and the architectural concept of the exhibition “Lydia Masterkova. An Enriched Retrospective” in Garage Museum

4th Festival of German speaking countries in St. Petersburg DACH_FEST 2022

book presentation “Reibungsverluste” by Mascha Dabić

Symposium “New Elements”

Open Call for applications for the LITERATURE SCHOLARSHIP “Grazer Stadtschreiber: in”

Participation of the Austrian publicist and translator Erich Klein at the XXV Chekhov Readings, as well as lectures about the works of the poet Paul Celan at the Sakhalin State Universal Scientific Library and The Library for Foreign Literature named after M.I. Rudomino

Digital Museum. Museums during lockdown in Moscow and Vienna

Stefan Zweig. World Author (Video of the exhibition in the Literature Museum of the Austrian National Library)

Open call for curators to take part in the Main Project of the Moscow International Biennale for Young Art

New Elements

Exhibition of Xenia Hausner in the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts

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