Susanne Wenger

The Osun grove in Oshogbo was designed by Susanne Wenger and her students.

Shrine within the Osun Grove in Oshogbo

Susanne Wenger , also Adunni Olurisa , (born July 4, 1915 in Graz , † January 12, 2009 in Oshogbo , Nigeria) was an Austrian artist .

Life

The daughter of Swiss-Austrian parents attended the arts and crafts school in Graz and the higher graphic federal teaching and research institute and then studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna , among others with Herbert Boeckl .

From 1946 Wenger worked for the communist children's magazine “ Our Newspaper ”, the cover of which she designed for the first edition. In 1947 she was a co-founder of the Vienna Art Club . After stays in Italy and Switzerland , she went to Paris in 1949 , where she met her future husband, the linguist Ulli Beier . In 1950 the couple emigrated to Nigeria . From 1957 she designed covers for the literary and art magazine Black Orpheus published by Baier .

Wenger contracted tuberculosis in Nigeria , turned to the native Yoruba religion and later became a Yoruba priestess. She was the founder of the archaic-modern art school "New Sacred Art" and guardian of the sacred grove of the goddess Osun on the banks of the Osun River in Oshogbo . The sculptures she created there in the late 1950s together with local artists have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2005 .

At the beginning of 2009, Susanne Wenger died at the age of 94 in Oshogbo.

Honors

• Silver Medal of Honor for Services to the State of Lower Austria (2001)
• Great Golden Decoration of the State of Styria (2004)
• In January 2016, the Graz City Council named a path in the city park - from the Kepler monument to the Glacis - after her.

Exhibitions

• 1995: Retrospective for the 80th birthday , Minoritenkirche Stein
• 2004: On a sacred river in Africa , Kunsthalle Krems
• 2006: Susanne Wenger - Life with the Gods of Africa , City Museum Graz
• 2015: Susanne Wenger - Life with the Gods on the 100th Birthday , Museum der Völker Schwaz

Publications

• Art as a living ritual , Iwalewa-Haus, Bayreuth 1991.
• With Wolfgang Denk : Susanne Wenger - deep within you you are oh man the god as a tree, as a stone, as an animal: a biographical collage , exhibition catalog Kunsthalle Krems, 1995, ISBN 3-901261-02-8 .
• With Gert Chesi : Susanne Wenger: A life with the gods , Perlinger, Wörgl 1980, ISBN 3-85399-004-5
• Peter Probst. "Modernism against Modernity. A Tribute to Susanne Wenger." Critical Interventions, Journal of African Art History and Visual Culture , 2009, No. 3/4, 245-255

Filmography

• Living with the gods: Susanne Wenger in Nigeria . Courage Films (Production) Hermann Kurasch (Camera) Monica Ladurner (Design). Documentation, ORF 2 Europe 2005 (29 minutes)
• Wolfgang Lesowsky: The mourning gods suffer from immortality. Susanne Wenger in Oshogbo . Media service UK (50 minutes)
• Wolfgang Lesowsky: On the banks of a sacred river in Africa. Susanne Wenger . ORF / 3SAT, 2001 (29 minutes)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Corso  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Günter Eisenhut: In memoriam Susanne Wenger - Adunni Olurisa  
2. ↑ Collection of cover images compiled by Josh MacPhee on the blog of the artist cooperative JustSeeds, published on August 29, 2016
3. ↑ Data from Susanne Wenger: Weblog Susanne Wenger
4. ↑ Federal Chancellery Austria: Susanne Wenger - she built bridges across continents and cultures ( Memento of the original from December 5, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
5. ↑ Peter Probst. "Modernism against Modernity. A Tribute to Susanne Wenger." Critical Interventions, Journal of African Art History and Visual Culture , 2009, No. 3/4, 245-255
6. ↑ Office of the Lower Austrian Provincial Government - State Office Directorate: Silver Decoration of Honor for Susanne Wenger  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
7. ↑ State Parliament of Styria: All awarded Great Golden Medals ( Memento of the original from March 7, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF file; 4.4 MB). P. 48 
8. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from January 17, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 100 years of Susanne Wenger: Symposium and naming of the way for a special artist, City of Graz, November 5, 2015, accessed January 17, 2016. 
9. ^ Ein Weg für Susanne Wenger, Der Grazer (Print), January 17, 2015, p. 6
10. ^ ORF Styria artist Susanne Wenger (93) died on January 13, 2009.
11. ↑ Die Presse Nigeria: Graz High Priestess of the Yoruba dead , sequence of images from the film ORF 2, 2005.

Web links

• https://susannewengerfoundation.at
• Literature by and about Susanne Wenger in the catalog of the German National Library
• Susanne Wenger
• Obituary of the TAZ
• Video tribute to Iya Adunni (Susanne Wenger), 1915 - 2009
• “Susanne Wenger, artist and high priestess of the Yoruba is dead” , Afrikanet, viewed on January 20, 2009

1. ↑ Welcome. Retrieved May 7, 2019 .