Viennese Actionism

What is Viennese Actionism?

Viennese Actionism is a radical art movement in which the work is not a picture on canvas but the action itself, involving the body, blood and ritual (actionism). The artist here does not paint but acts: their material is their own body and an intense, often provocative experience. Its best-known figure is Hermann Nitsch. Can you imagine a picture that takes place only once and then disappears?

When and how did it come about?

It was born in the 1960s in Vienna, at a time when many artists felt the need to leave classical media behind and go beyond what was considered decent or permissible. It responded to the post-war atmosphere and sought to strike the viewer directly, bodily, without the protective distance of a frame. That is precisely why it became one of the most radical expressions of post-war art.

Who are its main figures?

The best-known face of the movement is Hermann Nitsch, whose extensive ritual actions became an icon of the whole movement. Around him moved a group of artists who raised the body and the act to their principal means of expression. What united them was the conviction that the strongest artistic experience comes not from looking at a thing but from taking part in an event.

How does it do on the market and how is it traded?

Here things are unusual: the action itself is fleeting and vanishes the moment it ends, so it cannot be traded. What reaches the market is therefore what remains of it: photographic and film documentation, relics from the actions and the certificates that confirm the work. A collector is in effect buying the trace of a moment, proof that something unique really took place.

— Anna Pulkertová, founder of Art Part Club