Sex in the City
5 – 27
September 2003
KUNSTHALLE wien project space karlsplatz
Treitlstraße
2, A-1040 Vienna
Daily 1 - 7 p.m.
Infoline +43-1-52189-33,
www.KUNSTHALLEwien.at
Opening:
Thursday: 4 September 2003, 7 p.m.
“Sex in the City" recalls the
title of a popular lifestyle television series that humorously tracks down the
erotic foibles of neurotic young urbanites. Yet “Sex in the City" is also a
symbol for the transformation of sexuality in the highly rationalized,
thoroughly commercialized urban environment in the media and Internet age. Sex
does not mean exclusively the direct interaction of human bodies, but rather,
gains a phantasmal dimension in the virtual era. It becomes a game with
replacements, fantasies, imaginary projections of sensuality on bill boards, in
films, and pop songs along with their accompanying video clips, whereby a
mediator often stands between sexual desire and its satisfaction (telephone sex,
erotic chats on the Internet, etc.).
The exhibition “Sex in the City“
shows four international artists’ confrontation with the theme of female
sexuality and urban society:
Elke Krystufek plays with the performative
diversity of sexual appearance in her videos: It´s a Small World (1999) and
Paris is Burning (1995): a logistics of jouissance, guided by the wish-machine
of a commercial-erotic surplus.
The —Canadian and French artist Nadine
Norman confronted the social and economic conditions of sexuality and desire in
two major projects that are documented in the exhibition. In Call Girl, a
controversial project that took place at the Canadian Cultural Centre in Paris
was discussed in parliamentary debate in the Canadian House of Commons. She made
it possible for visitors to book supposed “prostitutes” for a certain amount of
time, who were then available for discussion. The maintenance of the structures
of a client relationship gave rise to intimate levels of communication that
circled issues of availability and the relationships between money, power, and
bodies. Also in Je suis disponible – Et vous? (I'm available– And you?, 2002),
in a play on classified ads and dating organizations, Nadine Norman combined
characteristics of the capitalist working world with private, but publicly
negotiated social wishes and sexual desires.
In her video She loves SEX,
and she hates SEX (2001), the young Japanese artist TANY slips into the roles of
various women who speak about their personal approach to sexuality, which is
still taboo today within the male-dominated, rigid norms of Japanese society.
From the individual positions, which are in part entirely fictional and in part
based on talks and interviews with women, a multi-faceted, fragmented, and
contradictory self portrait of the artist develops. In her video Dedicated to my
Ex-Lover (2001) TANY beats her ex-boyfriend, the artist Makato Aida. Together,
they staged an ironic act of reconciliation for Aida’s career and private
success since their separation and at the same time a parody-based drama of
jealousy and pain.
Annie Sprinkle (U.S.) travesties the legends of holy
prostitutes and the knowing superiority of female sexuality. In Annie Sprinkle´s
Herstory of Porn (1999) Sprinkle, who at the beginning of the 1980s was among
the first female pornographic film producers, tells of her life as a porn star
and performer, presenting a story of female emancipation within the sex industry
and ironically, at the same time, a career in art. In Sluts and Goddesses (1992)
Annie Sprinkle becomes a sexologist and teacher by describing How to Become a
Sex Goddess in 101 Easy Steps.
By employing the topos of sexuality, all
four artists within the exhibition quite consciously stage their appearances as
women within an art world which places demands on them, as well as us, in terms
of desire and availability.
Curators: Gerald Matt, Eva
Kernbauer
Accompanying the exhibition will be a catalogue with
contributions
from Meike Schmidt-Gleim and Andrea Salzmann / Julia Fuchs
as well as a detailed interview with the four artists.
German, approx.
64 pages; € 7,-; ISBN 3-85247-048-X
Program:
Sa. 6
September 2003, 5 p.m.: exhibition talk by Nadine Norman
Sa. 20 September
2003, 8 p.m.:
Noritoshi
Hirakawa: "Streams by the Wind - Heat Stroke"
Parallel to “Sex in the
City” from 5 – 27 September, showing in project space karlsplatz will be the
slide series “Streams by the Wind – Heat Stroke” by the Japanese artist
Noritoshi Hirakawa. His work focuses on dealing with social and sexual
restrictions.
_______________________
Information and photo material:
Katharina Murschetz,
KUNSTHALLE wien, Office: Museumsplatz 1, A-1070
Vienna
Tel.: +43-1-521 89-1221, Fax: +43-1-521 89-1220,
e-mail: presse@kunsthallewien.at
http://www.KUNSTHALLEwien.at
