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Location:
Embassy of Austria
3524 International, NW
Washington DC, 20008

Admission: free
Visitors are welcome to visit the exhibit
Monday to Friday 10am - 4pm

In cooperation with the austrian cultural forum was

Young Austrian Photography - ARCHITECTURE | LANDSCAPE presents a cross section of the current Austrian photography scene. In addition to different approaches that the Austrian artists have

taken about architecture and landscape, the exhibition project provides an overview and insight into contemporary Austrian photo creativity.

"Space and Nature" forms a visual starting point for a broad array of interpretations of the tangible experience of reality.

The works of the eight Austrian artists selected for this exhibition examine, in a wide range of ways, the perception and manipulation of our daily surroundings – worlds at once graspable and utterly alien, in part constructed -or perhaps in turn destroyed- by man or, not least, ones artificially generated, seemingly infinite in their reproducibility.

Nearly half of Austria’s terrain is covered with forest – an environment MARKUS GUSCHELBAUER negotiates, in his own words, in the dual guise of agriculturalist and manager. In his works the subject of vital resources is transposed to the Austrian woodland; he places nature itself on the stage, elevating it to the role of principal performer. CLEMENS ASCHER’s futuristic vision, on the other hand, takes on man’s hostile activities in the ‘colonialization’ of nature. Likewise, a platform for visions – permeated by a deep sense of time’s standing still – is offered by TINA RIBARITS in her photographs, in which artificial-seeming worlds create a space for memories but also for nightmares.

CATHARINA FREUIS utilizes irritation by staging equally artificial spaces that are, however, readily identifiable as stereotypes. In what ways does the viewer experience alienation?
From a technical standpoint JULIE MONACO goes one step further in the direction of the artificial construction of nature through her use of the computer. The sea becomes charged, its contrasts unnaturally increased, or it is made placid. She posits an image of nature generated in perfection, at once attractive and simultaneously disturbing.

CLAUDIA LARCHER attends to the connection between homeland and identity, memory and family history, placing them in a setting of clarity and reduction that nearly turn reality into abstraction. MARKUS OBERNDORFER works with the political history of yore that nevertheless continues to affect our lives, bringing it into the present day through contemporary representation and reprocessing. And GREGOR SAILER accords to current political sites unknown to most people because of the remoteness or inaccessibility of their locations – or because they are restricted military zones – a face and a new kind of presence, focusing us on our pronounced desire for security.