40 YEARS OF FOTOGALERIE WIEN

The gallery is closed from 23 December 2021 until 6 January 2022.

An anniversary catalog will be published for the exhibition and all events at the beginning of February 2022.

sponsored by: BMKOES; MA7-Kultur; Cyberlab

This year, a major anniversary is being celebrated: 40 years of FOTOGALERIE WIEN – a long time during which much has changed in regard to artistic photography: The understanding of what photography can be, how it is taught and mediated, the theoretical reflections on it and the cross-medium opening it has undergone.

The FOTOGALERIE WIEN was founded in 1981 by the artist and designer Josef Wais and shortly thereafter began to be run collectively on a grassroots democratic basis. The non-profit gallery is constituted as an association, Association for the Promotion of Art Photography and New Media, whereby new media only enters the picture after 2005. From the beginning the gallery has consistently fought for public acceptance and recognition of photography as an art form in its own right. Communication, exchange of information and cooperation with others was important in this endeavour and was always sought. The start of a collective collaboration was a photo breakfast in 1982, where people interested in photography came to develop initial conceptions of a gallery with a focus on artistic photography. Exhibition rooms, an office and, later, a cinema were built into an old machine hall in the WUK. In 1983, the first extensive and important exhibition curated by the collective at the time took place: New Photography from Vienna. Many years have passed in the meantime and photography is now an established art form.

Over 40 years, FOTOGALERIE WIEN has shown around a thousand exhibitions in various formats – such as special focus, solo shows, work shows and thematic group exhibitions as well as exchange projects accompanied by programmes involving thousands of artists from Austria and abroad. There have also been numerous publications and editions. The invitational BILDER magazine has become a gallery trademark.

The anniversary celebrations are intended to underline what distinguishes the FOTOGALERIE WIEN from other institutions and what makes it so special. This is, on one hand an eventful history and, on the other, the cross-generational, collective orientation. All those who have been part of this over the years have left their mark, made their contribution and given of their ideas. For that reason the anniversary will focus on the work of the collective, on the resulting cohesiveness which continues to the present, and the variety of different ideas in the development of exhibitions and projects. For the first time, the focus will also be on the individual members of the collective and their different approaches.

Each member of the current collective of ten people – eight artists and two art historians – has invited four artists to each provide or design a poster motif for the anniversary exhibition on a specific theme/viewpoint. So within the exhibition one encounters ten different sub-curations that make visible the collective potential and /or the respective interests and understandings of art. The 40 posters presented in the show will also be offered as editions as well as being widely distributed in public space. Numerous artists and fellow travellers will celebrate the anniversary with various accompanying programmes/events; in addition, there will be an open Project Wall that will be used in different ways.

The anniversary offers are also to be understood as thanks to the loyal friends, the artists and the visitors of the gallery over the years.

Curators/subjects/selected artists:

Hermann Capor, Was Licht kann (What light can do):
Birgit Graschopf, Sissa Micheli, Wolfgang Reichmann, Robert Zahornicky

Christian Eiselt, wechselwirken (interact):
Anja Manfredi, Andreas Müller, Anja Nowak, Laura Sperl

Susanne Gamauf, Wie alles begann (How it all started):
Eva Choung-Fux, Friedl Kubelka, Gabriele Rothemann, Eva Schlegel

Christian Gold-Kurz, Positionen zur Abbildung von Bau, Häusern und Landschaft
(Positions on the illustration of buildings, houses and landscapes):
Bitter & Weber, Mary Gold, Bastian Schwind, Julian Turner

Tobias Izsó, Processing:
Thomas Albdorf, Gašper Kunšič, Julian Lee-Harather, Simon Lehner

Michael Michlmayr, Broadening the View:
Thomas Freiler, Robert F. Hammerstiel, Claudia Larcher, Simona Reisch

Andreas Müller, Dunkle Artefakte (Dark artifacts):
Alek Kawka, Klaus Pamminger, Hermes Payrhuber, Patrick Topitschnig

Petra Noll-Hammerstiel, Konstruierte Wirklichkeiten (Constructed realities):
G.R.A.M., Michael Michlmayr, PRINZpod, Christina Werner

Johan Nane Simonsen, Fleischgewordene Fotografie (Photography incarnate):
Robert Bodnar, Rosa John, Michaela Moscouw, Hyeji Nam

Patrick Winkler, Material und Materie (Material and matter):
Philipp Fleischmann, Nikolaus Gansterer, Roberta Lima, Olena Newkryta

EVENTS – 40 YEARS OF FOTOGALERIE WIEN

Many thanks to:
all participating artists
MAK, Vienna
filmcoop vienna
EIKON, Vienna
Copyboxx, Ms Wurzel, Vienna
Ruth Horak, Schwadorf
Choir Kördölör, Vienna
WUK building services, Vienna