Markus Schinwald

The exhibition is part of the Coming Soon MAMbo + Museum – Shows program; Concept by Gianfranco Maraniello and Andrea Viliani

With the exhibition of the Austrian artist Markus Schinwald (Salzburg, 1973), at the Palazzo Poggi Museum and the Bologna University Library, the Galleria d'Arte Moderna continues to present its 2006-2007 program entitled Coming Soon MAMbo + Museum - Shows. Investigating the multiple personalities of the contemporary museum, this series of monographic exhibitions dedicated to the emerging artistic scene will accompany the upcoming move of the Galleria d'Arte Moderna to its new location in the former ‘Forno del Pane’, where in 2007 it will adopt the new identity of MAMbo – Museo d’Arte Moderna di Bologna.

At the time of their inauguration in 1712 in the halls of Palazzo Poggi, the collections of the Istituto delle Scienze e delle Arti di Bologna were neither exclusively scientific nor artistic. The archaeological finds, the anatomical wax figures of the ceroplastics Ercole Lelli and Morandi-Manzolini, the surgical instruments of the physician Giovan Antonio Galli, the 16th century “theater of nature” of the naturalist Ulisse Aldovrandi, the collections of mineralogy, botany, zoology and palaeontology, were gathered together as the instruments of a multidisciplinary research in ceaseless evolution.

These complex collections, with their continuous overlapping and integration, represent the ideal platform for the exhibition project by Markus Schinwald. Specifically conceived for the historical framework of the museum, it appears as a “fictitious archaeological excavation” within the museum’s itinerary. Borrowing from the mechanisms of performance and of theatrical and cinematic direction, Schinwald confers on the works displayed – paintings, wallpaper, prints, automated sculptures and billowing curtains – a continuous semantic and formal oscillation. Amidst the Institute’s antique showcases and in the frescoed halls that house today, in addition to the museum, the Bologna University Library, the works of Schinwald reflect almost mimetically the ambiguity of the artifacts that could be, at one and the same time, either ancient objects or contemporary artworks. I don’t want to be in conflict with the character or feeling of a museum such as this one. On the contrary, I w ish to incorporate its flow and overall atmosphere into the exhibition format. A contemporary format that reflects a type of ancient science fiction as if this were an exhibition in translation, as if someone were speaking today in an archaic language. (M. Schinwald)

With a lucid gaze at the fetishes and clichés of the society of consumption, the artist mingles fish taxidermy with shoes and handbags, using commercially available ones modified by him to create non sense objects that emphasize the affinity with and contrasts between different historical moments and cultural models. Exploring the contradictory evolution of modern knowledge in his continuous oscillation between discovery and error, reality and make-believe, science and art, the artist employs these logical détournements to undermine the principle of specificity of the artistic language and the modernist hypothesis that identifies the contemporaneous with the avant-garde, suggesting and investigating the possibility of new narrations that redefine the very concept of the contemporary cultural institution.

Curated by Andrea Viliani

Palazzo Poggi Museum Via Zamboni 33, Bologna Bologna University Library Via Zamboni 35, Bologna

24th Nov 2006 - 7th Jan 2007 Opening 23 Nov 2006, 6:30 pm

Markus Schinwald, born in Salzburg in 1973, lives and works in Vienna. The artistic practice of Schinwald, one of the most interesting and acclaimed artists of his generation, moves among performance, theatre, cinema, fashion and psychoanalysis. Through historical, artistic and philosophical references, his works explore the boundaries between private and public dimension and cognitive and behavioural dynamics, with special emphasis on body gestures.

Among his most important one-man shows: CAC, Bretigny-Argos, Brussels (2006); Ausstellungshalle zeitgenossische Kunst Munster, Munster (2005-2006); tableau twain, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt (2004); dictio pii, Sprengel Museum, Hanover (2004) and Moderna Museet, Stockholm (2001); Gap, Museum Fridericianum, Kassel (1999).

Among the collective shows: I still believe in miracles II, Museé d’Art Moderne, Paris (2005); Lebt und Arbeit in Wien II, Kunsthalle, Vienna (2005); 3’ condensed information, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt (2004). He has also participated in Manifesta 5, San Sebastian (2004), the Venice Biennale (2003), and the Berlin Biennale (2006; 1998).

Pressetext

Markus Schinwald
Kurator: Andrea Viliani
Ort: Palazzo Poggi Museum, Bologna; Bologna University Library