Soll Kunst in den Bunker/Vienna
November 20th, 2010
© Peter Kainz / MAK
Peter Noever – Director, MAK Vienna
Gennaro Postiglione – Professor at the Politecnico di Milano
James Turrell – Artist, Flagstaff/New York
Valentin E. Wille – Architect and Author, Vienna
Erwin Wurm – Artist, Vienna
Moderatorin: Alexandra Föderl-Schmid – editor-in-chief DER STANDARD
15th November, the newspaper Die STANDARD arranged the round table ‘Sool Kunst in den Bunker‘ (link to video & info) to discuss about the idea of Peter Noever (Director of MAC-The Museum of Contemporary Art in Vienna) to transform one of the several Flak Towers still stending in the city into the Museum of the XXIst Century Art. The idea of and ‘Artists’ in residence programme’ is the trategy to gain the foremost contemporary museum, and the same tower transformation, with the wish to have realized an idea proposal by James Turrell (one the most distinguished contemporary US artists in the world scene), would be witness of the MAK desires to have in Vienna one of the most exlcusive and avanguardistic Art program in Europe.
The discussion was very strong and the presence of hundres of people show how high is the interest of Viennese on the future of the Flack Towers. Wrongly, many of the people in the room (one of the Flak Tower storage speace) had the belief either the building could be used for almost anything without any connection with its history either nothing could be really possible because of that history. A position, Gennnaro Postiglione was strongly criticising: there is an urgent need to re-use War Heritages – was his opinion – but the process has to negotiate both the programme (not any use is elegible, but art is for sure a sustainable one) and the building history (through an adequate information strategy). Like in Freud’s theory, the design process has the role of elaborating the Trauma: any act of removal (through phisical demolition or deleteing of memories) will only have as result the increasing of phsycological stress and pain.