The Paradise the Downfall

The work of Graz-based artist Hartmut Skerbisch (1945–2009) can be seen as contributing to a second generation of Austrian conceptual artists. Starting with the media installations Spatial Arrangement: Putting Allspace in a Notshall, 1969/2012—a joint work with Manfred Wolff-Plottegg, today owned by the Universalmuseum Joanneum—the exhibition at the Kunsthaus Graz chiefly traces the artist’s media works. A key role is also played by the reconstruction of his legendary exhibition zepter und gleißender stein, which in 1977 was shown at the Neue Galerie Graz for the duration of just one hour.