About

Württembergischer Kunstverein sees itself as a venue for an open examination of the manifold approaches and practices of contemporary art – and their far-reaching social fields of reference. Here, open implies above all that we do not regard art education as tying it down to a determinable discourse, but rather as activating multilayered and contradictory interpretations.

As an institution, the Kunstverein offers ways of seeing art that nevertheless remain open and, ideally, tangible and questionable: what we want to create is sources of friction.

Very much in line with Antoni Muntadas’ statement “Warning. Perception Requires Involvement”, the aim is to promote involvement, participation in art as well as a critical detachment from it.

Contemporary artists have extended their practices into widely ramified areas of society over the past forty years, overtaxing classical institutional structural conditions in an extremely creative manner. Today, they operate between the role patterns of artists, curators, magazine publishers, designers, architects, documentarists, programmers, web forum operators, independent institutions – and many more. They create their own locally and globally entrenched networks, that, parallel to the art business, produce critical and participatory spaces of communication and action.

Artists are constantly redetermining “classical” media such as drawing, painting, sculpture and, meanwhile, photography and video art. They have appropriated the Internet, software, computer games or mobile telephony as a field for artistic experimentation.

For an institution such as Württembergischer Kunstverein, that sees itself as an interface between the mercurial practices of contemporary art and its manifold audiences, this primarily means expanding our own formats, functions and education practices.

A key approach towards this end consists in generating the Kunstverein’s programme on the basis of both local and international networks. In addition to projects we curate ourselves, this means regularly inviting freelance curators and institutions to conceive exhibitions, film programmes, workshops, etc. for the Kunstverein or to showcase their own projects here. On this basis the aim is to give rise to a programme reflecting the heterogeneous nature of contemporary art as well as heterogeneous curatorial approaches.

As of 2005, in co-operation with the Stuttgart Wand 5 association, the installative media art works of the international “Stuttgarter Filmwinter” film festival will be on show at the Kunstverein in a special exhibition lasting several weeks: in order to regularly showcase young positions in media art in a setting that caters for the special requirements of this art form – and as an alternative to the usual festival activities in which space-based media works are generally presented only as sidelines.

“On Difference” (2005 and 2006), in turn, investigates new curating formats. The point of departure of the project – an examination of local contexts, critical practices and networked spaces of action of contemporary art – is interpreted by various international curators in the sense of a “work in progress”: in the form of two exhibitions as well as symposia, film programmes, workshops, magazines and a publication. All in all the project will involve more than one hundred curators, artists, critics, film-makers, urbanists, architects and activists from Egypt, Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Iran, India, Lebanon, Morocco, the Netherlands, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, South Korea, Hungary and the USA, among others.

“On Difference” sees itself as a “pilot project” for a long-term exploration of the critical practices of contemporary art: beyond the constraints of focusing on the “Western” world. Specifically, the aim is to develop models of “translation” – for example between art, activism and institutions, but equally so between local and global “realities”.

“On Difference” has given rise to numerous new productions. The Kunstverein sees this as another of its key tasks: to support artistic production.

Furthermore, our aim is to regularly showcase international positions – with solo exhibitions, for example featuring Mark Tansey (2005), Antoni Muntadas (2006), or with the Anna Oppermann retrospective planned for 2007 – positions that are rooted in the artistic practices of the 1970s and 1980s and that we fell are relevant to the current discourse of contemporary art.

Württembergischer Kunstverein is primarily a venue of contemporary art. For this reason – given that contemporary art has long ceased to obey any narrow canon – we are constantly, and from different perspectives, focusing on such fields as architecture, urban planning, economies, political and social developments, film and technologies.

Exhibitions such as “Contenance” (2005) or “Dan Perjovschi, Fernando Bryce, Michaël Borremans” (2006), in turn, deal with aspects of contemporary art in an essayistic manner by creating open fields of reference.

The experimental aspect of the annual members’ exhibition, finally, consists in examining vastly different artistic positions by means of communicative processes – not negating differences but rather handling them in a productive and creative manner.

Fundamentally, Württembergischer Kunstverein also sees itself as an interface between art and teaching: this means that we involve the numerous local universities in our activities at many different levels.

In 2005 we already set up a mobile workshop that is available as an open workroom with magazines, catalogues, CDs and DVDs, Internet connection, copier, etc. In the course of 2006 we will also be setting up a project room in which we present young artists’ projects.

We look forward to your visit.

Hans D. Christ / Iris Dressler