A freaky weakling on the Heldenplatz

[imomus]

I'm in Vienna, staying in a room in the Meridien Hotel, just across the Ring from the Opera, in a room bigger than some apartments I've had, and considerably more grand. I'm here for three nights, which is generous for a performance which will last just an hour on Thursday evening. But one thing I've learned is that Vienna isn't short of money, and loves to spend it on art.



This is a rich, conservative town with a taste for ostentation and the finer things in life. As I walk about dressed like a stevedore, I find the city is as culture-shocked by me as I am by it. People at the opening party for the Art Week -- held at the palatial Dorotheum in a room dominated by the twin-headed eagle of the Hapsburg Empire -- walked up to me as if I were an exhibit, took photographs, and left. They treated me as if I were a work of art, which in a sense is how I was presenting myself (I was dressed for my performance, though I've still to receive the shiny golden bullhorn the Vienna Art Week people have procured for me).



I knew nobody at the Dorotheum party, which seemed to co-incide with an auction event, so I just drifted around on my own, looking and feeling weird. An array of paintings, furniture and silverware was on offer, with expected auction prices marked on the labels ($20,000 for an Andy Warhol Polaroid). I was as fascinated with the audience as some of them were with me. That rich Japanese businessman, for instance, with his moccasined, Bambi-legged daughter -- but no, she's his wife! Look at the loving way they're holding hands!



After admiring Kokoshka paintings, a horrible photo of Madonna in a Keith Haring dress, and the Ettore Sottsass mirrors, I got too hot and a bit tipsy on sekt and pineapple juice. So I slipped away from the Dorotheum and just walked around the chic streets, passing the horse academy where horses are trained to do all sorts of fancy high steps, or record shops displaying nothing but classical records in their windows.



What's really striking is the sexy brutality of the statues around the Heldenplatz, which invariably depict muscular men clubbing less-muscular figures to death. It's as if Goliath had triumphed over David by sheer size and force. I have the feeling that I would certainly be the kind of freaky weakling this Viennese hulk would love to club to death, but that -- by means of an anomaly known as "art" -- I am not only spared, but have the bully on my side, protecting me, and laying down his club to snap photos.

Comments

[shadowshark.livejournal.com]

Definitely something to relate to in there!

I'm glad to hear Vienna isn't as uninteresting as most visitors make it out to be...

[imomus.livejournal.com]

For my own amusement, a list of Viennese who've marked me:

Ernst Jandl, Sigmund Freud, Oskar Kokoshka, Peter Handke, Elfriede Jelinek, Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Adolf Loos, Karl Kraus...

I'm sure there are more, but that's already plenty.

[(Anonymous)]

If you've got the time, why don't you get a bus over to Bratislava in Slovakia? It's only an hour or so away, and personally I found it more interesting than Vienna.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I've been to Bratislava, long ago before the Yugoslavian war. It is quite an interesting and charming town. But I have to be in Vienna for all the art events.

[(Anonymous)]

long ago before the Yugoslavian war

You're mixing up Slovakia with Slovenia

[imomus.livejournal.com]

No, I'm just saying that since I visited the town in 1990, it was before the war that began in 1991 and redefined that whole wide area.

The Man Without Qualities

[(Anonymous)]

today, 19th, there is an opening at the T-B A21 - a lot of arty weird people!
tomorrow, 20th, the opening in the secession, you might know some people there (that you don't feel so lonely!!)
check out the really small but excellent japaneese restaurant called "Kuishimbo" near the Naschmarkt.

...hope it's getting better for you in Vienna, nice stay!

PS: as a visitor to vienna you could act like Musil's protagonist Ulrich "the man without qualities" - I think that you would understand Vienna a lot better than

[(Anonymous)]

It's strange how the part of a town you stay in has an impact on the way you see a city as a whole. I stayed in Vienna for a few days a year and a half ago and I must say that I saw the city as a genteel eco-firendly midly psychedelic and shambolic place (with a lot of strip joints for some reason). This is, I think, largely because I was staying in districts 5, 6 and 7 (to the East if I remember rightly) and only ventured within the ring once or twice.

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

Those are some of the works of Herakles. The last is him vanquishing the Hydra. No idea what the other two are, they don't make any sense. But he was a massive gay so I daresay he would have liked to club you bb.

Though obviously the bottom left one is Poseidon.

gas o meter

[(Anonymous)]

i loved vienna
mozaRTS grave was A high light dont if you a grave yard dweller
plus all the gorgeous arian souls
and lovely gypsy markets
the more i travel the more it becomes the same
depends who your with ,
how your feel.
more the the phyisicality of the environment
dontcha knows it

[kineticfactory.livejournal.com]

Didn't the Austrians also invent the whole notion of laptop glitch electronica (of the "clicking/burbling noises high-mindedly made on an Apple laptop with MAX/MSP" variety)? Or does one just hear of the Austrian practitioners of this artform more because their government is more generous with art grants?

When I lived in Australia, it seemed that a disproportionate number of participants at events like What Is Music? (http://www.whatismusic.com/HOME.html) festival were Austrian.

Re: gas o meter

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

Don't troll me with spam poetry, momus.

Re: The Man Without Qualities

[imomus.livejournal.com]

That's funny, I just ate lunch (with Viennese artist Hermann Huber) at Kuishimbo! Okonomiyaki special, yum! Then I went to the Sezession, where they told me about the opening (which clashes with my performance tomorrow night). Will check out the TBA21 opening, thanks!

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Yes, people like Peter Rehberg invented laptop glitch, or could lay a good claim to it.

A friend reminded me of another important Vienna name: Wilhelm Reich!

[dailyrave.livejournal.com]

Huh, weird timing. I was wandering around Heldenplatz this evening, too. What a day to start reading your blog again! Anyway, I'll certainly make it out to your performance.

What else are you going to do in Vienna? I want to see your take on those super-kitchy Christmas markets.

[0marietta0.livejournal.com]

I really love Baroque art

freaky stevedore

[pay-option07.livejournal.com]

More like Polder Giest. Neoclassicism is an excuse for homo erotica.

[rearwindow.livejournal.com]

... and hopefully helmut qualtinger.

vienna is a good city, i like it here a lot. people do stare a lot, though.

[bonsai-human.livejournal.com]

That's the reply of a man who will never admit to being wrong, if ever I've seen one!

I found both Bratislava and Vienna quite dull. You're right about the staring in Vienna - I have never in my life encountered a people so conservative and unaccepting of difference as the Viennese.