2022 / Golden Au
Idea: Elisabeth Rössler
Collaboration: Zita Breu
July 6, 2022 / Aumannplatz, 18th municipal district, Vienna
This art project took a satirical look at the building boom in Vienna, which continues unabated despite climate change and the considerable number of vacant buildings.
The artists set up Au Invest AG, a construction company that acquires Aumannplatz from the administration of Vienna’s 18th district (Währing) with the intention of building a high-rise block there, containing apartments, offices, shops, restaurants, and bars as well as a pool on the roof and a rooftop bar. The win-win situation is stupendous, the local authority obtains a huge sum of money to invest in electric buses to bring residents from A to B, allowing plans to make Währing car-free to be implemented. In return jobs are created, high-quality housing is built, and the revitalization of the heart of Währing is guaranteed, accompanied by an increase in the number of shops, while international firms are attracted to the area and move into state-of-the-art office buildings.
First of all, the grassy area of Aumannplatz was cordoned off with a red and white barrier tape. On all four sides of this public square posters were mounted that provided information about the fictional construction project. The managing director of Au Invest AG (Elisabeth Rössler) gave a speech consisting entirely of stock phrases taken from real estate platforms on the Internet. The project was launched with a ground-breaking ceremony, assistance was provided by a construction worker (Zita Breu).
2022 / disARMament
Idea: Zita Breu
Collaboration: Elisabeth Rössler
September 28, 2022 / Aumannplatz, 18th municipal district, Vienna
‘We must look the horrors of war in the eye, not so that we can see them as a misfortune but in order to denounce them as evil. War is not a primal catastrophe – it is the result of human madness and human insensitivity.’ (Bertha von Suttner)
The mechanisms of war always follow the same pattern, like in an endless loop: armament, manipulation, propaganda…
To illustrate the constantly recurring phenomenon of warmongering the artists made use of the roll, the act of unrolling, and the wheel. At one end of both long paths on Aumannplatz a device built of wooden trestles was set up, on which rolls of cloth were mounted. The lengths of cloth were unrolled along the paths and texts were then painted on them. Writing messages means making visible, unrolling, unveiling, announcing, making recognisable, acknowledging, making public, showing black on white or white on black. The messages were facts and figures about armaments and arms deliveries (on the black cloth), or statements about and calls for peace (on the white cloth).
After the texts had been painted the black pieces of cloth with the messages about warmongering were destroyed, whereas the messages of peace were hung up so that everyone could read them.
2013–2015 / "NÄHZELT"
Idea: Elisabeth Rössler
Collaboration: Gabriele Lobmaier-Rey
Location: various locations in and around Vienna
The "Das Nähzelt" initiative offers people in public spaces the opportunity to spontaneously sew a shopping bag from discarded clothes. The sewing machines required for this, as well as the clothes and sewing accessories, are provided in a tent. The artists help people who happen to pass by to give used clothes a second life and transform them into a bag. In doing so, they are encouraged to think about the phenomenon of the clothing consumption trap.
The opportunity to look at a discarded garment in a different way, to reshape it and give it a new meaning, as well as the experience of feeling the fabric as a raw material in your hands, gives you a very personal relationship with the shopping bag you have designed yourself, and you will therefore be happy to use it again and again.
The aim is to make people realise that upcycling is something meaningful and beautiful that they don't necessarily have to delegate. Everyone can actively participate in reviving old things by recognising their own resources and learn to use them.
In times of diminishing individuality in a standardised world, this project is intended to encourage people to reflect on personal things again. In addition, the idea behind it is to bring people together "in the village square", to awaken in them the desire to meet, to create something together and to exchange ideas.
