2019
> CRISS CROSS / Sebastien de Ganay / Raffaella della Olga
> Curated by Jürgen Tabor / Gil Yefman, Kibbutz Buchenwald
Gerold Tusch / appassionato-dolce-con spirito
> Gudrun Kampl / Schwarzes Gold
> Literal / Robert Barry, Julius Deutschbauer, Monika Piorkowska, Jana Sterbak, Peter Weibel, Lawrence Weiner
2018
> Matthias Herrmann Textpieces 96-98
Konkret Frau / Curated by Gerald Matt
> Masken
Tomasz Kulka / Das Ding
> Natalia LL
2017
> Renate Bertlmann
#It´s You too / Renate Bertlmann
> Anouk Lamm Anouk / I miss the place where I am from
> EASE / Robert Barry / Günther Förg / Tony Oursler / Keith Sonnier
> Artissima / VIVACE with Renate Bertlmann, Natalia LL and Jana Sterbak
> Curated by Eva Fabbris / LIVE END DREAM NO
> everybody anybody / group show
> liquid democracy / Monika Piorkowska, Curated by Angela Stief
> KeramiK Curated by Dietgard Grimmer with Jessica Lajard Barbara Reisinger Jeanne Susplugas Elmar Trenkwalder Gerold Tusch
2016
> Sébastien de Ganay / Non Places
> Clemens Wolf / Grounded
> Curated by / Michel Blancsubé / I´ve decided to be happy because it´s good for one´s health / Jana Sterbak
> Olga Georgieva / Looking for score
> Gudrun Kampl / Ornament oder Verbrechen
> Dieter Roth / aus einer Sammlung Exil, Selbstbildnis, Speedy-Drawing, Taschenzimmer
> VIVACE / Renate Bertlmann, Gloria Friedmann, Natalia LL, Jana Sterbak
2015
> Curated by / Myriam Ben Salah, Like The Deserts Miss The Real, Sarah Abu Abdallah, Abdullah Al Mutairi, Marwa Arsanios , Gcc, Raja’a Khalid
> Larbi Cherkaoui
> Julius Deutschbauer Klaus Pobitzer / Habs-Burgerstand, Ein Prä-Resümee
> Ilse Haider / le circuit heroesque
> Matthias Herrmann / On Photography
> Verortungen / Alyce Aycock, Peter Hopkins, Tania Kitchell, Ken Lum, Paul Morrison , Georges Rousse, Michaela Spiegel, Clemens Wolf
> Gudrun Kampl / Value Love Word Cell
> Curated by / Peter Stastny / Good NIght, Mister Procrustes / Francis Alÿs, Zipora Fried, Jim Shaw, Katrin Sigurdardottir, Kiki Smith, Jana Sterbak, Jeanne Susplugas
CURATED BY_VIENNA 2016
The gallery festival with international curators in Vienna
JANA STERBAK
"I´VE DECIDED TO BE HAPPY, BECAUSE IT´S GOOD FOR ONE´S HEALTH."
CURATED BY MICHEL BLANCSUBÉ
Opening 8 September 2016, 18 - 21:00
"Mask" will be perfortmed by Antonia Prochaska during the opening.
The work of Jana Sterbak, usually described in many publications as a Canadian artist with Czech roots, is often depicted as ambiguous.
The question of identity is one of the themes Sterbak delves into – often in a provocative manner. There are the known roots, and those that Sterbak cleverly exhumes and rends us in disguise. M. B.
View of the solo exhibition "I´ve decided to be happy because it´s good for one´s health" with Jana Sterbak curated by Michel Blancsubé
View of the solo exhibition "I´ve decided to be happy because it´s good for one´s health" with Jana Sterbak curated by Michel Blancsubé
View of the solo exhibition "I´ve decided to be happy because it´s good for one´s health" with Jana Sterbak curated by Michel Blancsubé
Jana Sterbak, Cone on hand, 1979-96, Gelatine Silver Print on paper, 50 × 35,5 cm, 3/15
View of the solo exhibition "I´ve decided to be happy because it´s good for one´s health" with Jana Sterbak curated by Michel Blancsubé
Jana Sterbak
"I've decided to be happy because it's good for one´s health."
We all start out part of a story whose own beginnings go back quite some time.
We know, for example, that Jana Sterbak entered the land of the living in Prague in 1955; that in 1968 she and her parents left for Canada after the arrival of Russian tanks in the Czech capital; and that in 2003 she represented her adoptive country at the 50th Venice Biennale.
There are, of course, known origins, and then there are the others: the ones some people insist on digging up and others invent for themselves. Artists (and Jana Sterbak in particular) are experts at this, and it's the overall negotiation between chance and determination that drives a body of work. The Sterbak oeuvre does not yield itself as a neat whole; on the contrary, it comes masked, paying no heed to our false, reassuring certainties. And after all, aren't elusive works the most deserving of our interest?
Taking its title from one of Voltaire's letters, the exhibition at the Steinek Gallery comprises works ranging from 1979 to 2016. Often described as ambiguous, her oeuvre raises issues including identity and what being means – or might still mean – in a world in which the economic rationale has gradually swept all other considerations away.
In 1987 Vanitas: Flesh Dress for An Albino Anorectic issued a crude, not to say cruel reminder that time corrupts the flesh we are made of. Generic Man of the same year – its subject photographed in back view with a bar code stamped on the nape of his neck – stresses the body as consumer product; or even as itself consumed, if we think back to the Artist as Combustible video of 1986. A combustible for what, in fact? For an artist-consuming art market?
Going slightly against the grain of some of today's art trends, Jana Sterbak continues to set her sights on serious, universal subjects such as aging and the ineluctable rise of the world's sea levels; in an interview dating from 2012 she reminded us that the work of art is above all a means of communication, and one under no obligation to be agreeable.
Michel Blancsubé, Mexico, 3 July 2016
The exhibition takes place in the context of the gallery festival curated by_vienna: Meine Herkunft habe ich mir selbst ausgedacht [My Origins? I Made Them Up]. The theoretical starting point for the participating galleries and curators is provided through the eponymous essay by cultural theorist and author Diedrich Diederichsen. With the project curated by_vienna, the Vienna Business Agency and its creative center departure have been supporting cooperation between Viennese galleries for contemporary art and international curators since 2009.
A portfolio will be edited with the kind support of
CURATED BY_VIENNA 2016
Meine Herkunft habe ich mir selbst ausgedacht
[My Origins? I Made Them Up]
Opening 8 September 2016, 6-9pm at all participating galleries
Duration 9 September until 15 October 2016
Free guided tours programm
Free guided tour programm # 2, Saturday, 17 September 2016, 12:00
Meeting point: Knoll Galerie Wien, Gumpendorferstraße 18, 1060 Wien
Tour: Knoll Galerie Wien, Galerie Crone Wien, Galerie Krobath, Galerie Martin Janda, Galerie Meyer Kainer, Galerie Steinek
Free guided tour programm # 3, Friday, 23 September 2016, 6 pm–9 pm
Meeting point: Hotel Bristol Vienna, Kärntner Ring 1, 1010 Vienna
Führung mit Diedrich Diederichsen
Tour: Galerie Steinek, Galerie Meyer Kainer, Galerie Martin Janda, Galerie Krobath, Galerie Crone Wien, Knoll Galerie Wien, Krinzinger Projekte, Galerie Raum mit Licht
curated by_vienna at viennacontemporary 22 until 25 September 2016
www.curatedby.at
CURATED BY_VIENNA 2016
The gallery festival with international curators in Vienna
Opening : 8 September 2016, 6-9pm at all participating galleries
Duration : 9 September – 15 October 2016
curated by_vienna at viennacontemporary 22 until 25 September 2016
Meine Herkunft habe ich mir selbst ausgedacht
[My Origins? I Made Them Up]
The exhibition takes place in the context of the gallery festival curated by_vienna:
Meine Herkunft habe ich mir selbst ausgedacht [My Origins? I Made Them Up].
The theoretical starting point for the participating galleries and curators is provided through
the eponymous essay by cultural theorist and author Diedrich Diederichsen. With the project
curated by_vienna, the Vienna Business Agency and its creative center departure have been supporting
cooperation between Viennese galleries for contemporary art and international curators since 2009.
www.curatedby.at
