The Enigma of the New and the Modern

The program presents short films and video works that deal with (acting in) urban space. At the beginning of the cooperation between the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts and the Alle School of Fine Arts and Design in Addis Ababa, the central focus of the first jointly planned program is on artists’ reflections on city structures and the current transformations of public space. The title of the project is borrowed from a project of the Ethiopian curator, Elizabeth Wolde Georgis, in which she critically examines the most recent wave of modernization ideology that has been breaking over African cities such as Addis Ababa, throwing light on its promise as well as its dark side. While in the case of Addis Ababa the current paradigm of ‘development’ takes center stage and is commented on by the Ethiopian artists, this is recapitulated for Vienna using historical examples supplemented by performative video works.

Film Program

Ein Film vom neuen Wien (election propaganda film of the SDAP [Social Democratic Worker’s Party]), 1926–27, 13 min
Wien 1963 (Advertsing film in the style of a ‘symphony of the city’ made for the Planning Department of the City of Vienna in the early 1960s), 1963, 16 min
Hans Scheugl, Hernals, 1967, 11 min
VALIE EXPORT, TAPP und TASTKINO, 1968/1969 (1989), 1 min
Katrina Daschner, Me and Me in Alsergrund – das Sexuelle ist das Reich des Politischen, es gibt keine Verbindlichkeit, 2002, 5 min
Mihret Kebede, Identity vs. Change, 2014, 7 min
Berhanu Ashagrie, The City is the People, 2013, 7 min
Ovidiu Anton, Political Graffiti Exchange Vienna-Marseille, 2011, 2 min
Ovidiu Anton, Veränderung der Länge und Breite eines Straßenabsperrpfostens von 406 x 10 cm auf 265 x 14 cm, 2007, 5 min
Carola Dertnig, Strangers, 2003, 3 min
Carola Dertnig, Stroller II, 2008, 4 min
Mulugeta Gebrekidan, The Neighbours, 2014, 4 min
Mulugeta Gebrekidan, Inside Out, 2013, 3 min
Luiza Margan, The Ghostly and the Golden, 2014, 9 min
Helen Zeru Araya/Nina Schuiki, Eri Bekentu, 2012, 10 min
Recherchegruppe zu schwarzer österreichischer Geschichte und Gegenwart (Coordinating MC: Dominic Mariochukwu Gilbert aka Item 7), Let It Be Known, 2006, 5 min

Presented by Elizabeth Wolde Giorgis & Christian Kravagna

Elizabeth Wolde Giorgis is an assistant professor of Art History and Visual Studies at the Skunder Boghossian College of Performing and Visual Arts of the University of Addis Ababa. She is curator at the Museum of Modern Art / Gebre Kristos Desta Center in Addis Ababa.

Christian Kravagna is an art historian and curator. He works as Professor for Postcolonial Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna.