Schiele – Rainer – Kokoschka

Giving the world (my) order describes the collecting activities of Viennese lawyer Ernst Ploil, who has been intensively involved with fine and applied arts for half a century. Starting around 1900, the idea of the Gesamtkunstwerk (total work of art) and the notion of the equality of the individual art forms were the central themes of his collecting activities. Selected and acquired in order to find answers to the eternal question of what art is all about.

One recognizable methodological approach is to identify commonalities, another is to focus on contrasts, and a third investigative approach is offered by symbolic narratives, whose often hidden meanings lead to exciting research and different interpretations.

All of this is presented in a parcours comprising approximately 180 works by artists as diverse as Anton Romako, Carl Schuch, Kolo Moser, Josef Hoffmann, Carl Moll, Egon Schiele, Oskar Kokoschka, Anton Kolig, Herbert Boeckl, Rudolf Wacker, Fritz Wotruba, Maria Lassnig, Josef Mikl, Markus Prachensky, Arnulf Rainer, Hans Bischoffshausen, Gerhard Richter, Josef Albers, Franz West, Marcel Duchamp, Wassily Kandinsky, Chuck Close, Richard Artschwager, Morris Louis, Ad Reinhardt, Dan Flavin, and Donald Judd.

Curator: Herbert Giese