
Günter Brus
Wiener Spaziergang, 1965 (1989)
S/W-Fotografie / b/w photograph
39,2 x 39,2 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, erworben/acquired in 1989
(c) Günter Brus
Photo: mumok
Günter Brus
Wiener Spaziergang, 1965 (1989)
S/W-Fotografie / b/w photograph
39,2 x 39,2 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, erworben/acquired in 1989
(c) Günter Brus
Photo: mumok
Günter Brus
Ohne Titel, 1960
Dispersion auf Papier / Dispersion on paper
125 x 90 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, erworben/acquired in 2004
(c) Günter Brus
Photo: mumok
Otto Mühl
Nahrungsmitteltest, 1966
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, erworben/acquired in 1987
(c) Bildrecht Wien
Photo: mumok
Otto Mühl
Hautkrankheiten, 1965–1966
Fotografien, Zeitungsausschnitte, Dispersion auf Karton / photographs, newspaper clippings, dispersion on cardboard
83 x 64 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Schenkung Gesellschaft der Freunde der bildenden Künste/donation of the Society of the Friends of Fine Arts Vienna 1996
(c) Bildrecht Wien
Photo: mumok
Hermann Nitsch
16. Aktion, für Stan Brakhage, 1965 (2008)
SW-Kontaktabzüge / b/w contact sheets
je / each: 30,4 x 23,8 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Schenkung des Künstlers/donation of the artist 2007
(c) Bildrecht Wien
Photo: mumok
Hermann Nitsch
Die Wunden des Ölbergs bluten, 1960
Wachs, Weihrauch, Stoffstücke, Farbpulver auf Leinwand / wax, incense, cloth pieces, paint powder on canvas
75 x 60 x 5 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, ehemals Sammlung Hahn/Former Hahn Collection, Köln/Cologne erworben/acquired in 1978
Peter Schwarzkogler
3. Aktion "mit einem menschlichen Körper", Sommer 1965
S/W Fotografie / b/w photograph
40 x 30 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien
Leihgabe der Österreichischen Ludwig-Stiftung/On loan from the Austrian Ludwig Foundation, seit/since 1984
(c) Österreichische Ludwig-Stiftung
Photo: mumok
Rudolf Schwarzkogler
Ohne Titel (Sigmund-Freud-Bild), 1965
Lack, Schnur, Korkstöpsel, Rasierklinge auf Pressspanplatte / lacquer, string, cork stopper, razor blade on particle board
108 x 53 x 5,5 cm
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Leihgabe der Österreichischen Ludwig Stiftung/On loan from the Austrian Ludwig Foundation, seit/since 1984
(c) Österreichische Ludwig-Stiftung
Photo: mumok
Vienna Actionism was one of the most radical artistic movements of the twentieth century and has lost none of its contentiousness today. In the early 1960s its main protagonists Günter Brus, Hermann Nitsch, Otto Muehl and Rudolf Schwarzkogler went beyond the boundaries of painting in favor of actions with real bodies, objects and substances in space and time. Their objective was a “direct” confrontation with sensory and psychic reality in all its aspects—including those that are tragic, difficult to stomach and above all socially repressed—which would be intensified through artistic form in order to bring about heightened consciousness. They pursued this with radicalism and unwillingness to compromise that is almost unparalleled in the history of art. Response to their actions, or to the photographic and filmic images which they generated, was and is accordingly intense. Their work caused uproar and scandal—not only at the time it took place—but it also provoked discussion on taboo issues and in the end was a co-initiator of a process of social rethinking.
In art-historical terms Vienna Actionism made a significant contribution to those international developments of the 1950s and 60s that returned to subject matter taken from the ‘real’ world after Western post-war art had been dominated by abstraction and its introspective content.
As an international competence center for Vienna Actionism mumok not only holds significant works by the Viennese actionists Günter Brus, Otto Mühl, Hermann Nitsch, and Rudolf Schwarzkogler, but also contemporary documentary materials and numerous recordings, notebooks, action photos, sketches, and correspondence.
The collection presents the development of actionism from its early challenge to painting to the expansion of painting in favor of staging events in space and time. This unique collection is the world’s largest.