1968: Viennese Actionism

Viennese Actionism became nationally and internationally known through the event “Kunst und Revolution” (“Art and Revolution”), better known under the name “Uni-Ferkelei” (“University Obscenity”), which took place on June 7, 1968 in Lecture Room 1 of the New Institute Building (NIG) at the University of Vienna. Participants included Günter Brus, Otto Muehl, Peter Weibel and Oswald Wiener. Brus and Wiener were convicted for degrading symbols of the Austrian state and blasphemy, and went into exile in Berlin.

In 1969, Peter Weibel coined the term Viennese Actionism for this group of artists who, starting primarily with the US Happening and Fluxus movement, developed an independent form of art that went beyond painting. At the centre were events  (actions) with actual bodies. “Their objective was a 'direct' confrontation with sensory and psychic reality in all its aspects—including those that are tragic, difficult to stomach and above all socially repressed—which would be intensified through artistic form in order to bring about heightened consciousness.” This description is available on the homepage of the mumok, considered the international centre of competence for Viennese Actionism.

The core of Viennese Actionism includes Günter Brus, Otto Muehl, Hermann Nitsch and Rudolf Schwarzkogler. Viennese Actionism is connected to the Vienna Group and other Viennese intellectuals and artists of that time — a scene that was consistently male-dominated. Only Valie Export was able to hold her own and succeed as an artist.