FLiege off_space explorations: February highlights
eSeLSCHWARM "FLiege" Foto: Rehearsals of Porosity (Kevin Space, 17.2.2023)
Artistic research in the 15th district: VIKTORIA
VIKTORIA considers itself a space for artistic research and social design. Intriguing to me, since I am in a social design master’s program at Angewandte. While social design is a very interdisciplinary field, it has a pretty straightforward essence: using design to respond to social questions [that’s what ChatGPT said when my classmates and I weren’t so sure]. VIKTORIA is not just a space for the finished product, but also offers itself for the process. The projects they present have a social context, and they host co-working, neighborhood evenings, and workshops. When I went, they embraced the interdisciplinary by offering a meal that picked up on the topic of the presented artwork.
Centering FLINTA* in Mariahilf: WAF Galerie
The Wiener Art Foundation Galerie is a friendly space. The brightly lit rooms right next to Haus des Meeres are run by two Vienna-based artists. Hailing from the AI/digital and sculpture-making realm, they now grant their space to people they like, host exhibitions with guest curators, and put an emphasis on FLINTA* representation.
Invitations and complementations in Seestadt: Contemporary Matters Studio
The Contemporary Matters Studio is a work and exhibition place on the very outskirts of Vienna in the orderly planned neighborhood of Seestadt. Run by the platform Contemporary Matters, the space offers itself for projects that relate to awareness of “the contemporary” in an increasingly interdisciplinary context. While the platform is independent, their studio is financed by Bank Austria. Hence, in their “curated by” Contemporary Matters format, the collective picks up their topic including the context they work in - “financial dependency from a capitalist company.” Their “hosted by” Contemporary Matters on the other hand allows guest artists to pick their topic freely and use their space at no cost.
Contextualizing artistic processes in the 2nd: Kevin Space
While their name is faintly reminiscent of a luckily de-platformed Hollywood figure, kevin space operates in quite the opposite way. As a blank site within walking distance from Praterstern, kevin space gives out invitations to artists and groups to fill their space. The projects they host are often specifically conceptualized for the room and take local as well as international developments into account. They can include visual arts, discussions concerning the political and social contexts of the work, and more experimental approaches.
Text & photos: Fricka "FLiege" Lindemann