Change, transformation, mutation, metamorphosis: Manfred Wakolbinger questions the surrounding space around us and puts our perception on a new level, in order to open us up for receiving beauty. From 3 of June till 14 of Octobre 2012 works of Manfred Wakolbinger will be presented at the Gallery of Lower Austria for Contemporary Art at Dominikanerkirche Krems, Körnermarkt 14. We met Manfred Wakolbinger in his atelier in Vienna and produced an artist-portrait.

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According to a Presocratic the intelligible is found in movement, and if truth is a materializable or at least recognizable human endeavour, its possibilities are codified within the capture and the apperception of the eternal flow, of the continuous change and movement.
This ultimate cause leaves its mark on the work of Manfred Wakolbinger, who is obsessed with identifying the sources and transformations of reality.
Something cryptic is concealed in all his works, by means of which the surrounding space camouflages- sometimes an object appears to be what it is not, yet it can also be what it seems. Wakolbinger makes the viewer collaborate with his work; he invades the space of the individual viewer and plays with it, his sculptures engage in a struggle between human perception and the laws of physics.
His realism is of a second order, demands a decoding of the symbols and a deconstruction of the signifiers. As a creative result, this process imposes upon the viewer an expansion of his visual conjectures.
Whether if film, photography or sculpture, Wakolbinger uses the most diverse techniques to achieve a single effect: creating inner and outer images which generate and display emotions and perceptions. His works rearrange the space in which they are, causing uneasiness and perplexity. Manfred Wakolbinger is an artist who does phenomenal journeys through reality and reflects on what he sees. Investigating the relations between micro- and macrocosm, he searches for causalities, creates ambivalences and is never entirely certain about anything. more »

The Fondation Hubert Looser is one of the foremost private collections of modern and contemporary art in the region of Switzerland, placing its main focus on Abstract Expressionism, Minimal Art and Arte Povera. In addition to single works of Giacometti, Picasso, Kiefer and other stars the collection includes work groups of Willem de Kooning, John Chamberlain, Cy Twombly, David Smith, Agnes Martin, and also Giuseppe Penone. From April 26 till July 15 2012 a big part of the collection will be presented the first time in the context of a museum at Bank Austria Kunstforum in Vienna. On occasion of the spectacular show CastYourArt visited Mr. Looser in Zürich and produced a collectors-portrait.

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„Every passion borders on the chaotic, but the collector’s passion borders on the chaos of memories.” (Walter Benjamin). This passion makes the collector dream, even more, it makes him dream, imagine and think; memory functions in images, hence the decision to collect them. more »

Whether in Brazilian Favelas, Turkish Gecekondu, or in Vienna’s Schmelz: For their strategies of self-empowerment, citizens do not need any ideological superstructure. The exhibition “Hands-On Urbanism” at Architekturzentrum Wien from 15 of March till 25 of June 2012 reflects historical and contemporary strategies of city development initiated from citizens. An exhibition-portrait by CastYourArt.

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Cities’ official image is usually focused on the consequences of urban planning, the representative and tangible parts of architecture and of the “hard” infrastructure. Urban planners generally focus their work on planning interventions on a big scale, in order to attain qualitative transformations of the urban environment. Therefore the informal city usually tends to stay invisible. In the last years, due to a significant decline of public investment, and unfavourable financial circumstances for this kind of projects, varied citizen’s initiatives on a small scale have been created. more »

His oeuvre is the essence of a long and to a large extent autonomous artistic process, leading from figurative, expressive metaphoric painting to a kind of condensed, very personal alphabet of geometric shapes. An artist-portrait by Hans-H. Schellenberg.

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Attilio Zanetti Righi (* 16.3.1926 Schaffhausen, † 21.5.2011 Zürich), studied from 1948 until 1950 at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze. 1952 Scholarship at the Istituto Svizzero in Rome. 1953, 1954 and 1959 federal Swiss scholarship. From 1948 until 1960 ZanettiRighi lived in Florence, then until 1980 in southern Italy. From the mid-1990ies he lived and worked in Zürich and Rome. more »

Beauty and its construction and deconstruction in art can be seen in great diversity at the MUSA in Vienna until May 26th 2012.

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World-famous actress and beauty icon Zsa Zsa Gabor stated years ago: „There are no ugly women, only lazy ones” – her phrase mirrors the state of affairs today: Cinema, television, magazines and advertising constitute the space in which endless advice on self-improvement and –perfection is given about style, beauty, hairstyle, fashion and the like. A space, where the illusion of unlimited beauty is transmitted, of a limitless access without restrictions, of a capacity to overcome all barriers and differences: it does not matter what you are, but what you can be.

The quest for beauty and the determining social categories are critically examined in the works of Austrian and international artists of various generations in the show Beauty Contest, curated by Berthold Ecker, Roland Fink, Claude Grunitzky and Andreas Stadler. The project of MUSA in cooperation with the Austrian Cultural Forum Ney York has been directed by Natascha Boojar (New York) and Roland Fink (Vienna). The exhibition lasts from 17 February until 26 Mai 2012. There is a guided tour in sign language on March 2nd, 5 p.m. Entry is free. more »

Object and image, true and false, natural and artificial, credible and incredible – Evan Penny’s figures are all of the above. An exhibition-portrait on the occasion of the show at Museum der Moderne in Salzburg.

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He generates an unreal and uncanny world, where it is hard to distinguish what is real and what unreal. He dissolves the connection to reality and by avoiding producing an angle from where a stable image is visible; he shows his vision of a self that is in constant transformation. His enlarged visions of the individual, or at least of its morphology, allow observing the basic principles of existence – or not. more »

Libidinally charged works of the last 3 decades by Herbert Brandl are presented by Florian Steininger and Ingried Brugger in the Bank Austria Kunstforum Wien. CastYourArt visited the artist at his atelier and produced an artist-portrait. Watch now …

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The images constantly seduce the gaze, captivate it and invite the viewer to transcend the pictorial surface, look behind it in order to discover the spaces opening up within their –our- interior.
Brandl does not start his work on the basis of reality in order to abstract from it, he rather develops a pictorial grammar of perception –feelings or thoughts- and avails himself of the musical vocabulary of colour and of the personal expressive panache as trademark. more »

In the exhibition “PHANTOMAK” in the Vienna University of Technology, sculptures by the artist Tomak are presented to the public for the first time. The sculpture series PHANTOMAK consists of eleven individual busts of the artist, produced in a complex technical procedure – Wood Jackson, Rotpeter, Height, Headquarters…

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„Thus my work completes itself by the sculpture.“ (TOMAK)
The sculpture series PHANTOMAK was produced in the course of the past one and a half years. The works were manufactured in close cooperation with the Vienna University of Technology (institute of art and design – spatial development and modelling), the German company Rampf Tooling and an Austrian foundation. CastYourArt is responsible for the organisation of the project. more »

The building of the Vienna Secession is regarded as the structural manifestation of the ideas of artist union around Gustav Klimt, Koloman Moser, Carl Moll and others who refused the conservative artistic spirit of the Vienna Künstlerhaus. A feature about this historical and contemporary venue of the arts.

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Today the Vienna Secession, the union of Austrian artists, is the oldest independent exhibition centre dedicated to contemporary art worldwide. The building designed by the architect Joseph Maria Olbrich is regarded as the structural manifestation of the ideas of this artist’s union around Gustav Klimt, Koloman Moser, Carl Moll, Josef Hoffmann, Olbrich and others, whose members refused the conservative approach to art of the Künstlerhaus association at the turn of the century.
To confront the fin de siècle with a holistic art whose vitality would have its effect down to the ordinary everyday life! By means of the Secession building, this claim would obtain an actual location, in order to present art in a space-oriented and comprehensive way, within a synthesis of architecture, painting, sculpture, graphic art and decoration. The artistic approach with the building as its symbol still draws attention and now as then, the usage of the building causes excitement.
On of the most celebrated exhibitions was dedicated to Ludwig van Beethoven in 1902, a main work of which being the Beethoven Frieze by Gustav Klimt. On this 34-meter mural painting, the artist focused on Beethoven’s 9th symphony. The painting addresses mankind’s pursuit of happiness in various stages. Because of its explicit eroticism, Klimt’s work provoked admiration as well as severe criticism. At the time the Beethoven Frieze was situated in the left side aisle of the Secession’s main hall and was eventually removed in 1903. Today it is back in the Secession and installed in a specifically created room in the basement floor of the building.
With its spatial arrangement, the architecture of the Vienna Secession has remained relevant in our time. Its functionality and aesthetic peculiarity therefore offer ideal conditions for contemporary arts and exhibition activities. Thus, in accordance with the phrase carved above its entrance, to every age its art and to art its freedom, today the Vienna Secession accomplishes an internationally oriented program, presenting current artistic forms of expression in single and thematic exhibitions.
CastYourArt has created a feature about this historical and contemporary venue of the arts, giving an insight into the building, its architecture and history as well as its activities in contemporary art. (wh)

He has no employees, no assistants, no website or E-mail address. Ever since Glenn Murcutt opened his own office in Sydney in 1969, he works alone. An exhibition on Glenn Murcutt’s work can be seen at the Architekturzentrum Wien in Vienna till 13.02.2011.

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He states that he wants to free himself from the pressure of being responsible for staff. If necessary he cooperates with other architects, like his wife Wendy Levin. In the last 40 years, more than 500 buildings have been constructed, all in Australia, almost exclusively residential buildings and besides a few exceptions, designed, planned and implemented under his supervision. more »