PERSPECTIVES OF THE FUTURE. Merano 1945 - 1965
All Exhibitions29.9 – 13.1.2013
Curated by
Markus Neuwirth, Ursula Schnitzer
With more than 300 artworks, most of which are unpublished, the exhibition tells its visitors about the buoyant, varied, and ambitioned cultural scene in the town by the Passer river.
Life in the postwar years was many-facetted and exciting. Despite the politically charged situations, people hovered between normalization, awakening, and high-flown large-scale tourist projects. Ezra Pound, Oswald Kofler, Gina Klaber-Thusek, Hans Ebensperger, Mary de Rachewiltz, Ernst Nepo, Gino Severini, Peggy Guggenheim, Anton Frühauf, Salvatore Quasimodo, Luigi Serravalli, Antonio Manfredi, Karl Plattner and many others were the protagonists who gave the town a boost to international recognition.
Innumerable exhibitions, music, movie, theatre, and literature events led to a pulsating cultural life and attracted visitors from all over the world. Starting with a series of artist portraits, the Merano arte entrance and hall will lead us through the fifties in Merano: Who were the protagonists? What did they think about the local understanding of culture in the postwar years? How did they deal with their presence, and what were their visions for the future? Who signed the Merano Manifesto, and what were its demands? Which artists held exhibitions at the Wunderbar and the spa administration? The second section of the exhibition is devoted to the local artists of those years. Their works as well as the exhibits of international guests illuminate their understanding of art in the interplay of representational and non-representational painting or sculpture, photography, collages, assemblages, arts and crafts, as well as jewelry design. The final section of the exhibition is about lifelong friendships between artists, for instance between Anton Frühauf and Oswald Kofler as well as Hansgeorg Hölzl.
The cinematic portrait by Traudi Messini is a search for traces of works and artists in Merano. Moreover, Messini talks to a number of protagonists such as Umberto Volante, Oskar Müller, Mary de Rachewiltz, Willy Gutweniger, and Hansgeorg Hölzl. (The video will be shown on the second floor as of November 1; duration: approx. 30 min.)
The catalogue
The catalogue does not only feature the more than 300 works exhibited, but also 32 contributions by renowned authors as well as 200 further illustrations