BELVEDERE 21

EXHIBITION SYNOPSIS

The Belvedere 21 is devoting a large solo show to Christian Ludwig Attersee (* 1940) with a focus on his early work. Featuring as yet little-known works, the show reveals how Attersee actively shaped and participated in the revolution in artistic production from the 1960s.

Over the course of almost sixty years, Christian Ludwig Attersee has created a multifaceted oeuvre with a very unique visual language. From his Würfel-BH to his Prothesenalphabet, from his wine label to the Attersee sausage, from his postage stamp to the Attersee house, the Austrian artist has turned his name into his trademark and ‘atterseeised’ his world. Pop, humour and irony characterise his work, which draws on the subjects of his life like the weather, sailing, nature, music and language. Similarly, the subjects of beauty and eroticism permeate Attersee’s entire oeuvre.

The exhibition Feuerstelle shows all aspects of Attersee’s oeuvre, focusing on the first twenty years of his creative career. Whereas the bright colours and visual subjects in the early stages of his oeuvre are reminiscent of Pop Art, from the mid-1970s the artist adopts a more gesturally expressive drawing style that later morphs into the painterly. Collages, works on paper, photographs, films, music and paintings are displayed on an equal footing with inventions, craft and product design. More recent pictures complement Attersee’s early work and make it possible to identify the rigour in his oeuvre.