‘Instructions for Happiness’

Anna-Sophie Berger, Keren Cytter, Heinrich Dunst, Simon Dybbroe Møller, Christian Falsnaes, Barbara Kapusta, Rallou Panagiotou, Angelo Plessas, Maruša Sagadin, Hans Schabus, Socratis Socratous, Jannis Varelas, Salvatore Viviano, Anna Witt; curated by Severin Dünser and Olympia Tzortzi

21er Haus, Vienna

8 July – 5 November 2017

Happiness is a fundamental human emotion, and every single one of us strives to achieve it in one form or other. This individual pursuit of happiness also forms the cornerstone of this exhibition, but instructions for happiness? Happiness is a very personal thing, and so it seems—quite frankly—absurd to promise that we can get closer to it simply by following a series of instructions. Whatever the truth of the matter may be, this exhibition attempts to approach the phenomenon of happiness from a variety of different perspectives.
Since the dawn of history, humans have sought to discover what it is that makes them happy and at what point they can truly be called a happy person. Although today we have access to a wealth of self-help literature on this very topic, instructions for happiness have existed since antiquity, albeit in a more philosophical form. According to Plato, happiness was to be found in maintaining the balance between the three parts of the soul—reason, spirit, and appetite—and preventing them from coming into conflict with one another. Aristotle saw a fundamental link between happiness and self-fulfillment, as when you do what you set out to do well, you gain a place in society and, at the same time, contribute to its betterment. As far as Epicurus was concerned, an individual’s happiness hinged on strategic abstinence: an individual could gain greater happiness by pursuing their pleasures, taking care not to numb their senses by pursuing desires that exceeded their basic needs. One of these pleasures was the cultivation of interpersonal relationships. ‘Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for’ is one piece of life advice offered by Epicurus. ‘Learn to be silent. Let your quiet mind listen and absorb,’ advised Pythagoras, who was also quoted as saying: ‘The more our minds understand, the greater the blessings received.’
According to the old proverb, ‘every man is the architect of his own fortune.’ We all have a different concept of happiness, and since we each have our own individual needs, the fulfillment of these needs must necessarily be taken into our own hands. Regardless of whether fulfillment is sought in human relationships, the immediate, everyday life, or the beauty of small things, this exhibition seeks to challenge notions of happiness.
Anna-Sophie Berger’s piece, for instance, invites us to build a house of cards and knock it down again; to work with care and precision towards a specific goal and retain the freedom to leave behind the fruit of our labors at the end. In Keren Cytter’s video installation, visitors reflect themselves on the surface of a screen while watching a story of a family, a lover, a beach house, and a lonely boy, and are drawn into a meditative state by a soothing voice. Heinrich Dunst, meanwhile, raises questions about status. The phrase ‘Nicht Worte’ (Not Words) has been written on a page but has then been scored out; ‘Dinge’ (Things) has been written underneath. Is this a double negative, thus meaning words and things? Beneath this image lies a doormat featuring a Piet Mondrian design: it remains unclear, however, whether this mat is anything more than a thing or whether it instead constitutes an image-like thing or a thing-like replication of an image. The photo by Simon Dybbroe Møller shows a hug between a cook and a plumber. Is this a photo about interpersonal needs? It is, if anything, a representation of physical needs, consumption and digestion, the ‘basics’, so to speak. Christian Falsnaes’s sound installation instructs visitors to interact with one another through simple actions that obviously bring pleasure by playfully transgressing social conventions. Barbara Kapusta, meanwhile, invites visitors to make cups and bowls from modeling clay, to use their own bodies in the molding of drinking vessels that will satisfy basic needs. Rallou Panagiotou combines impersonal suitcases with replicas of things associated with happy memories, such as a pair of sandals lost on a beach in the 1990s and a mask—presumably of Medusa—that once hung on the wall of her grandmother’s summer house. Under the motto ‘Sharing is caring’, Angelo Plessas offers us a USB stick with files that can be transferred onto our own devices. These files seem to cover every one of life’s eventualities and include self-help books, music for meditation, and advice on love and spirituality. Jannis Varelas, on the other hand, instructs us to leave the exhibition space and go for a walk around the city. As we walk, he asks us to think about whether or not we want to go back and turn our attention once more to art. Salvatore Viviano asks us to ask ourselves how lonely we feel while listening to Elvis Presley laughing as he sings ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight?’ Maruša Sagadin’s sculpture collection invites us to reflect on life in public space. On the one hand, she scrutinizes the opportunities for regeneration in urban spaces and on the other, the function of make-up and the formulaic conventions associated with it and representations of the self: if lipstick is a building, does that mean my face is a façade? A different question is asked by Hans Schabus and his sculpture: if good luck is a birdie, does that mean it is fleeting? And if that is the case, wouldn’t it be better to build a house for it? Socratis Socratous’s sculptures also deal with forms of flight and refuge. Small islands and bollards, made partially from smelted-down munitions from the world’s conflict zones, symbolize landing sites. The work focuses on migration over the seas and the safe havens that migrants hope to reach. Finally, Anna Witt’s video installation shows a group of people smiling for sixty minutes. Revolving around the commercialization of emotions and the sale of our own feelings, her video becomes a form of endurance test.
With their artworks, the artists shown in this exhibition ask us to follow instructions, respond to constructed situations, use objects to engage with others, or think about a particular theme. The different perspectives on show, in terms of both form and content, reflect the diversity of the artists’s own perspectives on happiness and those of society in general.
Walter Benjamin once wrote: ‘To be happy is to be able to become aware of oneself without fright.’ In this spirit, we invite you to interact freely with the artworks on display and to use this experience as a chance to reflect on the phenomenon of happiness. One’s own fulfillment is, after all, intrinsically linked to reflecting on one’s own needs and actions, which in turn leads to a conscious, self-determined life and mastery of the ars vivendi, the art of living. For as the sociologist Gerhard Schulze once said: ‘What does one live for, if not for the beautiful life?’

Exhibition catalogue:
Instructions for Happiness
Edited by Stella Rollig, Severin Dünser and Olympia Tzortzi
Including texts by Anna Sophie Berger, Keren Cytter, Severin Dünser & Olympia Tzortzi, Heinrich Dunst, Simon Dybbroe Møller & Post Brothers, Christian Falsnaes, Barbara Kapusta, Rallou Panagiotou, Angelo Plessas, Stella Rollig, Maruša Sagadin, Hans Schabus, Socratis Socratous, Jannis Varelas, Salvatore Viviano and Anna Witt
Graphic design by Alexander Nußbaumer
Photos by Thomas Albdorf
German/English
Hardcover, 22.5 × 16 cm, 128 pages, numerous illustrations in color
Belvedere, Vienna, 2017
ISBN 978-3-903114-41-8

»Instructions for Happiness«

Featuring works by Anna Sophie Berger, Liudvikas Buklys, Heinrich Dunst, Simon Dybbroe Møller, Christian Falsnaes, Benjamin Hirte, Barbara Kapusta, Stelios Karamanolis, Alexandra Kostakis, Adriana Lara, Lara Nasser, Rallou Panagiotou, Natasha Papadopoulou, Angelo Plessas, Maruša Sagadin, Hans Schabus, Björn Segschneider, Socratis Socratous, Misha Stroj, Stefania Strouza, Jannis Varelas, Kostis Velonis and Salvatore Viviano; curated by Severin Dünser and Olympia Tzortzi

Lekka 23 – 25 & Perikleous 34, Athens

December 21 — 30, 2016

Happiness can be understood as a basic human need. And the exhibition is all about the personal pursuit for happiness. But instructions for happiness? As happiness is quite an individual matter, instructions for happiness are of course a pretty absurd promise. Regardless of whether happiness is sought after in the interpersonal, the immediate or the everyday respectively the beauty of the small things in life – the exhibition tries to question the notions of happiness.

Selected artists were invited to contribute a work, that also includes a manual: A work that – based on an instruction – invites to do something, for instance use an object, react to a situation, interact with others under certain rules, perform something for others or oneself or simply initiates a thought process. The form of the work (as well as the instruction) could take any possible shape – resulting in artworks that are as diverse and formally divergent as the technical possibilities. But the seemingly chaotic diversity also reflects a plurality of perspectives on happiness that the artist (as well as society) share.

Aside from the question of happiness in the context of today’s Athens, the exhibition also tries to reflect upon art’s possibilities of immediate effects on society. Thus the boarders of the power of the aesthetic field can be questioned in the show on one side, while tracing the notions of happiness on the other side through experiencing the works in order to maybe also find answers for oneself.

Kindly supported by The Federal Chancellery of Austria, NON SPACES and KUP 

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»Instructions for Happiness«

Συμμετέχουν: Anna Sophie Berger, Liudvikas Buklys, Heinrich Dunst, Simon Dybbroe Møller, Christian Falsnaes, Benjamin Hirte, Barbara Kapusta, Stelios Karamanolis, Alexandra Kostakis, Adriana Lara, Lara Nasser, Rallou Panagiotou, Natasha Papadopoulou, Angelo Plessas, Maruša Sagadin, Hans Schabus, Björn Segschneider, Socratis Socratous, Misha Stroj, Stefania Strouza, Jannis Varelas, Kostis Velonis, Salvatore Viviano

Υπό την επιμέλεια: Severin Dünser, Olympia Tzortzi

Λέκκα 23 – 25 & Περικλέους 34, Αθήνα

21.12. — 30.12.2016

Η ευτυχία μπορεί να κατανοηθεί ως μια από τις βασικές ανάγκες του ανθρώπου. Ο Freud έλεγε ότι σκοπός της ζωής είναι η επίτευξη και η διατήρηση της ευτυχίας – και στην αναζήτησή της επιδίδεται η έκθεση με τίτλο «Instructions for Happiness». Αλλά είναι δυνατό να υφίστανται οδηγίες;

Μια σειρά από Έλληνες και διεθνείς καλλιτέχνες έχουν κληθεί να καταθέσουν την δική τους εικαστική απάντηση σχετικά με την κατάκτηση της ευτυχίας η οποία, στον βαθμό ασφαλώς που είναι για τον καθένα υποκειμενική, δεν μπορεί παρά να καθορίζει και τις «απαντήσεις» ως αυστηρά προσωπικές. Υπό αυτήν την οπτική, όλα τα εκθέματα απηχούν διαφορετικές προσεγγίσεις ως προς την μορφή αλλά και ως προς τους «κανόνες» που θα πρέπει κανείς να εφαρμόσει (ή και να απορρίψει) προκειμένου να εκπληρώσει, έστω και πρόσκαιρα, το πολυπόθητο αποτέλεσμα και, πάντως, όλα αυτοσκηνοθετούνται ως «οδηγίες προς απόκτηση ευτυχίας». Συγχρόνως, όμως, τα έργα δεν λησμονούν ότι η ευτυχία είναι ατομική υπόθεση, ότι ουσιαστικά κάθε υπόδειξη πραγμάτωσής της συνιστά ανεδαφική ή ουτοπική υπόσχεση. Εντούτοις δεν παραιτούνται. Κι έτσι καταφέρουν να στρέψουν την προσοχή στα μικρά αντικείμενα της ζωής και να αναδείξουν, με απρόσμενο τρόπο, την ομορφιά τους (ιδού μια στιγμή ευτυχίας!) – ή εφιστούν τη προσοχή στην «ευτυχή συγκυρία» ή και στην ευδαιμονία που μπορεί, φέρ’ ειπείν, να πηγάζει από άγνοια ή παραγνώριση της πραγματικότητας ή και από τη ζωηρή φαντασία ακόμη.

Προπάντων, όλα τα έργα της έκθεσης αμφισβητούν τις παγιωμένες αντιλήψεις για το τι είναι ευτυχία και θέτουν το ερώτημα του κατά πόσο η ίδια η τέχνη μπορεί να αποβεί «πρόξενος ευτυχίας», όχι απλώς ωραιοποιώντας αλλά ενεργά μεταμορφώνοντας τον γύρω μας κόσμο. Και εντέλει θέτουν το ερώτημα των ερωτημάτων: μήπως η ευτυχία προϋποθέτει πάντοτε την ευτυχία του άλλου, δηλαδή, θα πρέπει επιτακτικά να εννοηθεί σε ένα πολιτικό πλαίσιο;

»The Gestural«

Thomas Bayrle, Andy Boot, Christian Falsnaes, Roy Lichtenstein, Klaus Mosettig, Laura Owens, Markus Prachensky, Roman Signer

21er Raum at 21er Haus, Vienna

September 8 — November 20, 2016

Painting is the application of paint onto a surface. Brushstrokes are the constituent parts that make up an image. Unified through the process of painting, it is around these individual elements that this exhibition revolves.

A recent donation to the Belvedere, the painting »Rouges différents sur noir - Liechtenstein« by Markus Prachensky, will act as the starting point for a discussion surrounding aspects of style and the very essence of the gestural. Completed in 1956/57, the painting was named after the Liechtensteinstraße, where Prachensky created it in a studio he shared with Wolfgang Hollegha. Incidentally, this was the place where these two founded the artist group “Galerie St. Stephan” in 1956 together with Josef Mikl and Arnulf Rainer. The painting comes from an initial series of images in which Prachensky painted with red paint on a black background. The color red became a recurring element and something of a characteristic in the works that followed. Prachensky’s work is totally committed to Informalism, which made its way to Vienna from Paris, where it was initiated at the end of the 1940s. The movement was developed in response to the phenomenon of geometric abstraction, with which it shared a rejection of classical concepts of composition. However, unlike geometric abstraction, Informalism was defined by its formlessness and spontaneity. Prachensky was, therefore, mainly preoccupied with the tracing of a gestural impulse and the energy applied to a canvas.

What Prachensky emphasizes in this image is the procedural moment in the production of the image – with all its implications, reaching from unmitigated personal expression to speculation around its echoes of the unconscious. These gestures on a monochrome background come forth as clearly legible and thereby manifest a stark contrast. They are themselves transformed into their own kind of sign, a recognizable symbol of the gesture. This was also employed by Roy Lichtenstein in his series Brushstrokes, which took form between 1965 and 1968. Ironically, using oil on canvas, Lichtenstein transformed individual, overlapping brushstrokes into his typical cartoon style – making, as it were, caricatures out of the spontaneous moment, while also referring back to Abstract Expressionism. In the case of the Little Big Painting Reproduction, the theme of the series was also translated into chromography, industrially reproducing the uniqueness of painting and reducing personal expression ad absurdum.

Thomas Bayrle works with reproductions and the repetition of forms. As in Pop Art, these forms often refer to objects of consumer culture and can thus be read through a socially critical lens. He distorts individual pictorial elements by way of mechanical and digital manipulation; from there arise systematic structures that tend to reflect their constituent parts and so refer to the underlying logic behind image making. In Variations of a Brushstroke, Bayrle appointed the brushstroke as the primary motif. Arranged in differing deformations that amount to a collage covering the entire picture’s surface, this meta-painting questions the authenticity of its expression through its mechanical repetition.

Since 2007, Klaus Mosettig has been translating works by other artists into his own drawings. He projects the works onto paper and, over months of diligent work, records his interpretation into different shades of gray in a way reminiscent of print processes. Despite his elaborate manual process, Mosettig leaves behind no detectable mark of his hand. And yet, he has afforded his works an artistic autonomy beyond the originals they seek to reproduce. This could have to do with the time he invests in his works, which becomes clear upon close inspection. The template for Informel 2 was a child’s drawing. Analogous to the movement mentioned in title, the child’s drawing is an attempt toward direct expression, toward the experimental search for a personal visual language. Mosettig alters the reception of small gestures through appropriation, by copying them with pencil and enlarging them.

Roman Signer is known for his actions, but sees himself as a sculptor whose works deal with temporality, speed, and transformative processes. Pyrotechnics are a recurring element in his oeuvre. In the 2006 video Punkt, he sits at an easel in a meadow, dips his brush in paint and holds it to the canvas. Shortly thereafter, a box explodes behind him and startles him. Jumping at the sudden loud noise, he plants a point on the painting surface. The result of Signer’s premeditated startle-response corresponds almost literally to the transference of energy to the canvas that was realized by Informalism – save that Signer exaggerated this process of gestural painting in order to find an authentic expression of his own.

Andy Boot dealt in the depiction of expressive gestures early on, an example being his work e who remained was M that is part of the Belvedere collection. Boot takes noodles that have been dipped in colored paint and lets them fall to the surface of a canvas placed on the ground. The result is a neo-abstract-expressionistic pattern that dilutes the absurdity of the gestural moment to that of an ornament, thereby caricaturing its dynamism as illusionism. However, his 2012 work Untitled (light blue) indulges in these gestures without a hint of irony. In this work, he draped a light blue ribbon typically used in rhythmic gymnastics within the frame and filled it with wax. The use of this sports device meant to make movement more visible somehow produces something reminiscent of an abstract composition – a sort of meta-painting that points to the gestural in painting, without itself actually being painted.

Laura Owens as a painter is known for both her abstract and figurative works that cross and overlap in their application of different media, while taking a variety of references from art history and elements of popular and folk culture. She often chooses to focus on smaller aspects and details in her images when she tries out new techniques, thereby changing the style once again. The brushstroke as a decorative element and sign, feature increasingly within her works over the past few years. For example, her 2013 work Untitled (Clock Painting) does not stray far from the decorative. In this painting, she has incorporated part of a clockwork in which a hand moves over the image. What is part of the process of painting is also linguistically part of the clock: the pointer is also called “hand” and the strike of the hour “stroke.”  Therefore, the second hand can quite literally be read as a metaphor for the arm that moves while painting on canvas and virtually takes the form of a stroke, enabling Owens’ allusion to time as a factor in the production of images.

Performance being his medium of choice, Christian Falsnaes works with pre-made scripts that he follows more or less, and which motivate the audience to interact. He is concerned with making group dynamics accessible, but also with drawing attention to rituals and norms of behavior, particularly those within the art world. For this exhibition, Falsnaes has developed a new iteration of his piece Existing Things, in which the public is prompted to paint a picture together with a performer acting as the brush. The action effectively dissolves individual authorship into a collective process, leaving multicolored brushstrokes within the exhibition. 

In general, the brushstroke stands alone as a metaphor for art itself and, especially within the contemporary context, can be read with critical reference to the myth of the artist. The exhibition shows how the views of individual authorship, artistic authenticity, and originality have changed. These categories, terms which we use to perceive and reflect upon art, seem never to have fallen out of our collective imagination. However, the possibilities afforded by technical reproduction and medialisation have transformed our attitude towards the nature of the gestural in painting. Gestural expression has recently gained new appreciation because of its unification of qualities that hold something genuine, unaffected, and refreshingly corporeal over the digitization of our everyday lives.

»Grundfrage«

[Fundamental Question]

CRAC Alsace, Altkirch

February 17 — May 5, 2013