In the Austrian Alps, a modern private museum was set up between Vienna, Linz, Graz, and Salzburg in 2003, after five years of construction. Within a few years, it was awarded the Austrian Museum Prize for its innovative design and in recognition of the unusual dedication of its private owners to the preservation, presentation, and promotion of art.

According to the director of the collection, Michael Braunsteiner, the owners of the museum demonstrate a style that is “absolutely relaxed and somehow cooler”. This is surprising considering that the owners are not newly-rich young idealists, but the monks from the Benedictine Admont Monastery, which dates back over 1000 years, and whose monks are aged over fifty years old on average.

The developing years of the museum. Part 1

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Developing the contemporary art collection. Part 2

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Since the renovation, the Benedictine monastery does not only house the newly reconstructed, largest monastery library in the world, but also a museum complex extending over several floors, which includes an art-historical and natural history museum, as well its own permanent collection of contemporary art and exterior monastery spaces used for art installations.

In 1998, Michael Braunsteiner was assigned to lead the transformation of the museum Stift Admont and to curate the development of the contemporary art collection. CastYourArt spoke with him about the developing years of the museum, especially in regard to the arrangement and layout of the contemporary art collection. (wh/jn)

People go through life with open ears – they cannot close their ears, as they can their eyes, to the sounds of the world, unless they physically block them. The ear is a completely closed off sensory organ. We hear, even when we sleep. We hear sharply only rarely and perceive differently, those noises which surround and penetrate us. If we tune into ourselves and back in time, not only the sounds from streetcar, cow-, door-, recess, fire brigade, church, or bicycle bells resonate within us, but also an amazingly extensive audio cosmos. We come to learn that sounds have emotional connotations, that our feelings have different intonations.

A Hearing Perspective

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Sam Auinger is engaged with the world of sounds, tones, and noises and their geographical-cultural as well as historical differences. He thereby carries on a tradition of artistic involvement with sound in which people such as Erik Satie, Luigi Russolo, John Cage, and Murray Schäfer made history. Trained at the Bruckner Conservatory in Linz and University Mozarteum Salzburg, more »

New York has always been known for its international flavor and background, but until only recently, Austrian and German culture was not at the forefront of this range, largely due to a complicated history that has taken half a century to resolve. Culture is inevitably wrapped up in its history, and Austrian and German culture are definitely no exceptions, given the events of the last century.

The founding of the Neue Galerie.

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The reemergence of German and Austrian Expressionist art in New York.

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Klimt’s “Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I”

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However, Austrian and German modern art of the beginning of the 20st century has found a new place and home in the US, and the location could not be more appropriate: on the Museum on Fifth Avenue in New York, a formally German neighborhood. The Neue Galerie is a small but opulent institution founded in 2001 by two great enthusiasts for this period in art in the US, Ronald Lauder, renowned businessman and philanthropist, and the late Serge Sabarsky, art dealer and pioneer of German and Austrian Expressionist art in New York. more »

The author Josef Kleindienst, based in Vienna, writes “audio pictures”, plays, novels, and screenplays. We present an excerpt of “Become a Member”, to get the full version contact us here.

It is an audio picture of a relationship that is formed between three people due to an unexpected event. The ones involved are paralyzed in a moment of shock and unable to escape the situation. They are trapped in this involuntary gathering and struggle with actions and words to regain their fading composure.

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The speakers are Simona Sbaffi, Andreas Patton, Manfred Stella, and Simon Hatzl. Music by Hüseyin Evirgen. Sound by Johannes Kelz. Illustration by Elsa Mährenbach. Text and direction by Josef Kleindienst.

… this is Eugen Lendl’s answer to the question about what that special quality is that predestines one for the occupation of the gallery owner. However, “most of them originate from rich parents”, he says.

About the development of the gallery. Part 1

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About the relation between artists and galery owners in time. Part 2

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As a gallery owner, Eugen Lendl has experienced the limits of the handling of art, the artists with special gifts, and the impressive consistency and power of expression, which enriches his life. He is also familiar with the commercial aspects of art and its value, which translates into a lasting relationship with the customer. more »

Why are works of art valuable to us on a personal level? Sometimes, their value lies in how they link up with our origin: for example, an old picture which has been in the possession of our family for generations. It can also lie in its symbolic nature, if the acquisition of a work of art is coupled with a special moment in our life. Sometimes, our memories are kept alive by a work of art, addressing us in special ways that invoke happiness, reflection, or tranquility.

The art of insurance in a changed world of art. Part 1

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Art insurance for whom, at what time, and at which price. Part 2

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Steps for the insurance of art and possibilities of prevention. Part 3

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Beyond the personal level, art objects can be treated as cultural properties. They may possess for us unique and irretrievable styles. Their settings represent the development of certain ideas or groups of artists. They may document the awareness of the life of a generation, working as collective memories, verifying the strength of the multiplicity of human expression. more »

Misfortune comes in various forms, as well as the possibilities for avoiding misfortune: saving money or watching TV, loving or eating up, or perhaps just sleeping together. Cultivating moderation, recognizing can also help, sometimes deceiving, patching things up in emergencies in order to hold things together, making it big, or indeed, saving the world after all? In its 41st year, Steirischer Herbst, the contemporary art festival in Graz, is in search of strategies of avoiding misfortune.

About programing the festival Steirischer Herbst

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The leitmotif of the festival

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The art of avoiding misfortune in Steirischer Herbst 2008

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On election posters, smiling faces and simplistic strategies of avoiding misfortune can end up belittling the most complex of issues. Every advertisement promises a magic cure for avoiding misfortune: whiter teeth, low-fat sausages, power brakes. But there is something in the wind which still beckons us to approach things critically, a skeptical belief prevails that we are still able to do something. more »

“Contemporary art as a field for human freedom, as a possibility to understand a modern individual’s view of society.” The field of freedom is much broader than it would be without contemporary art, according to Slavko Bogdanovic, lawyer and chairman of the board of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Vojvodina. Therefore, it is already in the interest of all to maintain its existence.

Museum of Contemporary Art in Novi Sad, Vojvodina. Part 1

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Museum of Contemporary Art in Novi Sad, Vojvodina. Part 2

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Museum of Contemporary Art in Novi Sad, Vojvodina. Part 3

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The basic conditions for contemporary art are undergoing a radical change in Vojvodina, as in other parts of Serbia and the Southeast-European world. The pre-war structures of production, mediation, theory formation, and marketing have been destroyed or taken over; missing resources have been preventing and making the new conditions for advancement more difficult for a long time up until today. But the attitudes of many people in the art enterprise have changed. Instead of commiserating over existing adversities, they are taking action. more »

A good five centuries ago, a navigator called Vespucci had gained the respect of a cartographer called Waldseemüller, who decided to christen the Mundus Novus as the continent of America. The interest in Europe in imported goods from the New World had grown significantly in this time. With economic expansion, the Old World had also opened up a new area of knowledge, which was meant to be conquered scientifically.

Sylvia Ferino – Pears as Tearducts, a Corncob for an Ear. Part 1

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Sylvia Ferino – Pears as Tearducts, a Corncob for an Ear. Part 2

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Against the backdrop of this newly developing landscape of knowledge in the sixteenth century, the Milanese painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo began making portraits of human faces arranged from seafood, fruits, and vegetables in the court of the Habsburg king, Maximillian II. Of course, this kind of metamorphosis of the human face had already been mesmerizing people at the time and more »

In the art world, one thing leads to another—this is the principle by which Hans Knoll began his career as an art dealer, which remains his guiding principle up until today. Knoll began in the early 80s with a space, a weekly dinner among friends, artists, and accompanying guests, and the possibilities that arose from this set-up led to exhibitions, performances, and music. These events were at the time more along the lines of occasions for bonding. However, they eventually turned into serious gallery events and the subsequent realization that one must expand beyond Vienna in order to truly develop in the art world.

Hans Knoll - Art as a Form of Mediation, Interview Part 1

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Hans Knoll - Art as a Form of Mediation, Interview Part 2

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Hans Knoll - Art as a Form of Mediation, Interview Part 3

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Hans Knoll - Art as a Form of Mediation, Interview Part 4

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In the first half of the 1980s, the young art dealer was already getting involved with the art world in Hungary. He founded an artists’ co-op in Budapest as a kind of communist counterpart to his gallery and thereby set himself apart in the art world from the surrounding East European countries. more »