Uwe Bressnik

"Bressnik's 1210" / "Live Record", exhibition view "Laying tracks", Phono Museum Vienna 2013

Uwe Bressnik (* 1961 in Villach / Carinthia ) is an Austrian visual artist .

Life and career

Uwe Bressnik grew up in Carinthia and Upper Austria and has lived in Vienna since 1980 .

There he studied from 1983 to 1989 at the University of Applied Arts with Sepp Moosmann , Oswald Oberhuber , Peter Weibel and Ernst Caramelle .

plant

Uwe Bressnik follows a transmedia approach. He is working on a reinterpretation and contextualization of the artistic genres graphics, painting and sculpture by means of adjacent cultural fields such as new media, music or sport. The spectrum of his artistic activities ranges from drawing, computer graphics, photography, video, painting, (sound) object and installation to spatial design and performance.

Bressnik first received attention in the late 1980s for the Moving Images working group , in which he used the moiré effect of layered grid surfaces to create pseudo-digital images, objects and graphics. Starting in 2006, Bressnik lets large areas of such self-generating moiré images pulsate through kinetically generated movement (electric motor, fans) in public space ("revival" 2006, Kaiserstrasse Vienna, "lebenDIG" Klagenfurt Cathedral 2010) and transform ("Wandlung “Dom Maria Saal 1013).

In 1996 Bressnik founded the record label Soul Source Records (SSR), on which around 200 of his record images and objects, which can only be experienced visually, have appeared. The sub-label Vyl Vinyl Records (VVR) also merges the acoustic material record with everyday items such as pots, pans, teapots and the like.

In 2012, Bressnik expanded his label activities to include the performative format of SSR dubplates , in which he “records live” as a human direct-to-disc recording device with the participation of the audience at various art events (e.g. in the exhibition room .at '), where "under the title" Live Records "(...) temporarily the weirdest record store in Vienna (emerged)" (p. 49)

Since its inception, the Bressnik football game has also provided numerous impulses for transmedia interventions ("am Ball" 1993, "Pas de Bal" 1998, "Passionsfruchtfeld" since 2000, "Spielball" Museum Moderner Kunst Carinthia 2008).

Bressnik is repeatedly the initiator of independent formats for non-commercial art mediation, u. a .: "Künstlerhouse", Künstlerhaus-Passage, Vienna 1995–97, "Doubleheart-Hear the Art", Kunsthalle Exnergasse, Vienna 2002, "Heuriges" / Kunstsalon Joanelli / ausstellungsraum.at, Vienna, Kunsthalle Mengerzeile / M3 Treptow, Berlin 2005-15.

Since 2000 Bressnik has also been an improvising musician ( pocket trumpet , cornet (instrument) ) in several live music formations ("Große Freiheit Nr 7", "seelish", Vienna Improvisers Orchestra, HHH !!!). Bressnik is a founding member (2005) of the artist group and band "KunstSportGruppe hochobir".

Awards (selection)

1986 1st prize "Siemens Data Graphics Competition 1986", Vienna
1989 "Prize of the City of Vienna" and award for the diploma thesis at the University of Applied Arts, Vienna
1990 1st prize "10th Römerquelle art competition 1990", Vienna
1994 Prize of the jury of the "Förderpreis für Bildende Kunst 1994" of Bau Holding AG, Klagenfurt
1999 "Innsbruck Graphics Competition 1999", Prize of the State of Styria
2010 Appreciation Prize for Fine Arts of the State of Carinthia
2013 Austrian State Scholarship for Fine Arts

Solo exhibitions (selection)

2000 "Discotheque" Bau Holding Kunstforum, Klagenfurt
2001 "Intro-Projections", Associatione Culturale / Cineclub Detour, Rome
2003 "Discorganisch", Kunsthalle Treptow, Berlin
2004 "Bankruptcy", Künstlerhaus Klagenfurt
2004 "Compensation", Städtische Galerie Freihausgasse, Villach (with KSGh)
2010 "Live Records", ausstellungsraum.at, Vienna
2012 "Transkursionen", KunstVereinsHeim during the Documenta XIII, Kunstverein Kassel
2015 "Copy'n Paste", ausstellungsraum.at, Vienna
2017 "Music before and behind the objects" with Keith Rowe, project space MAG3, Vienna (P)

Group exhibitions (selection)

1984 "1984-George Orwell and the Present", Museum of Modern Art, 20er Haus, Vienna
1988 "1988-Looking ahead", Young Art in Austria, as part of the "Steirischer Herbst 88", Neue Galerie and Künstlerhaus Graz
1989 "Junge Szene Wien` 89 ", Secession Vienna
1991 "Art Europe - Young Art from Austria", Kunstverein Hamburg, Deichtorhallen
1993 "Fixed sizes", Upper Austrian State Museum Linz
1995 "Painting and cuckoo", Bau Holding Kunstforum, Klagenfurt
1998 "The tip of the iceberg", Kunsthalle Wien in the Museum Quarter
2006 "Sonambiente Berlin 2006", festival for hearing and seeing, sound art, sound art, Academy of the Arts, Berlin
2006 "Until today", Two Centuries of Modern Art in Carinthia, MMKK
2008 "Sound of Art. Music in Fine Art", Museum der Moderne im Mönchsberg, Salzburg
2008 "Vom Klang der Kunst", Tonspur Expanded, Freiraum / quartier 21 / Museumsquartier Vienna
2009 "Cat Open", MAK Contemporary Art Collection, Arenbergpark Battle Tower, Vienna
2012 "Modernism: Suicide of Art?", Universalmuseum Joanneum, Neue Galerie Graz
2015 "Room for John Cage / Room for John Cage", permanent exhibition at John Cage House, Halberstadt
2016 "Sound & Book - Acoustic Thought in the Arts", Salon for Art Book, Museum of the 21st Century / 21er Haus, Vienna (catalog)
2017 "#John CageSTEPS" - workshop, performance, exhibition, John Cage House, Halberstadt

Publications

The Sound of Silence - Soul Source Records & Editing (2018) Schlebrügge.Editor, Vienna, ISBN 978-3-903172-22-7
LIVE (2010), Schlebrügge Verlag Vienna, ISBN 978-3-85160-185-5
globalokal (1995) Catalog for the project of the same name with texts by Christian Höller, Monika Pessler, Ursula Graf and Egyd Gstättner, limit. Edition with raster multiple
Uwe Bressnik 90/91 (1991) Catalog for the exhibition series in the gallery at the Landesmuseum Joanneum, Graz Gallery on the city wall, Villach, and the Austrian Cultural Institute, New York