Chrysanne Stathacos
AA Bronson’s Sacre du Printemps

September 26, 2015–November 29, 2015
Grazer Kunstverein, Graz, Austria

Featuring AA Bronson with Igshaan Adams, Keith Boadwee, Ryan Brewer, Elijah Burgher, Nicolaus Chaffin, Michael Dudeck, K8 Hardy, Matthias Herrmann, Reima Hirvonen, Yeonjune Jung, Mark Jan Krayenhoff van de Leur, Chrysanne Stathacos, Scott Treleaven and JX Williams.

The Grazer Kunstverein’s continuous investigation into notions of social abstraction is carried further in response to the new ‘Leitmotiv’ of the steirischer herbst 2015, which investigates the notion of ’inheritance’ by starting out from questions of property, transfer of knowledge and our handling of cultural heritage.

In collaboration with the Salzburger Kunstverein, Grazer Kunstverein has invited artist and healer AA Bronson (b. 1946, Vancouver, CA) to develop a large-scale project at both venues simultaneously. AA Bronson operates in this hybrid project as artist and curator, subject and object, in which he includes his solo work, his collaborations with younger artists and works by friends. As a founding (and only surviving member) of the collective General Idea (1969–1994), AA Bronson has had a long history with political and social issues in art and publishing, and especially with the AIDS crisis. Since then he has collaborated with many generations of artists across many disciplines. In the last fifteen years he has taken on spirituality as a key theme in his collaborations and art production.

At the Grazer Kunstverein, Stravinsky and Nijinsky’s infamously scandalous ballet of 1913 gives name to this sequence of rites and sacrifices, overseen by sage elders, here given form in the person of AA Bronson himself. Themes of spirit, sex and darkness are knit into a labyrinth structure that takes over all the gallery spaces.

An oversized mandala of rose petals by Chrysanne Stathacos opens the exhibition and functions as a twin to a similar installation at the Salzburger Kunstverein. The artist installs the work during the opening while conversing with the public. The mandala is framed by a work of Yeonjune Jung. Jung’s What a Beautiful World! is a wallpaper installation, which depicts sites of gay trauma in London.