In the 1960s, the Austrian artist Adolf Frohner (1934–2007) travelled several times to Paris, where he encountered Nouveau Réalisme for the first time. Behind this movement were thirteen artists around the art critic Pierre Restany, a group that between 1960 and 1970 became a forum for a lively exchange of ideas.
The approaches taken by the Nouveaux Réalistes were manifold, ranging from an interest in the materiality of objects and an ironic reinterpretation of form to a performative conception of the artwork.
With selected objects, the exhibition Answers to Reality: Adolf Frohner’s Encounter with Nouveau Réalisme explores the connection between Adolf Frohner and the Nouveaux Réalistes. Particularly Frohner’s material pictures, objects, and assemblages of the 1960s reveal distinct references to Nouveau Réalisme. This sheds new light on Frohner’s work of this time, but also on his iconography of the figurative in the late 1960s and 1970s.
Key works from the collection of Vienna’s mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, César, Raymond Hains, and Daniel Spoerri will be presented. In honor of Spoerri’s ninetieth birthday, his work will constitute a focal point of the show.

The exhibition is presented in cooperation with the mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien.

Artists (selection): César, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Adolf Frohner, Raymond Hains, Daniel Spoerri

Curators: Susanne Neuburger, Elisabeth Voggeneder