The Gym is a hybrid space that interweaves exhibition, training and performance and sees itself as a counter-project to stereotypical body cultures, market-conforming standardization and other manifestations of neoliberally based self-optimization. A varied training program with weekly classes, extensive Sunday sessions and mental workouts will form the pulsating core of the exhibition space for five weeks. Together with around 40 participating artists, trainers and performers, the movement and thought radius of inclusive body politics and non-toxic fitness will be expanded, the mind-muscle connection strengthened and resistance training for body, mind and soul offered. Pleasure included
Anna Ehrenstein | Eisa Jocson | Elisabeth von Samsonow | Howardena Pindell | Karin Ferrari | Kubra Khademi | Mel Baggs | Philipp Muerling | Sophia Süßmilch | Suzanne Lacy | Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi | Tianzhuo Chen | VALIE EXPORT Fran Klein | Puti Kaisar Mihara | mirabella paidamwoyo* dziruni | Karin Cheng | Romy Kolb | Betül Seyma Küpeli | Roman Kettner | Samantha Petz | Maque Pereyra | Adil Embaby | Silke Grabinger | Songül Cinar | Ivy Monteiro | Ahmet Simsek | Ina Holub | Mr. Move it! | Marissa Lobo Faris Cuchi | Mzamo Nondlwana | Tamara Alegre | Marga Alfeirão | Cuba | Hyeji Nam | God’s Entertainment | Denise Palmieri | Myassa Kraitt | Geumhyung Jeong
Exhibition
The Gym exercises our physical and mental capacity for resistance in the spirit of joyful activism, calling for individual and collective reappropriation of body and mind. The exhibition features positions by Anna Ehrenstein, Eisa Jocson, Elisabeth von Samsonow, Howardena Pindell, Karin Ferrari, Kubra Khademi, Mel Baggs, Philipp Muerling, Sophia Süßmilch, Suzanne Lacy, Thenjiwe Niki Nkosi, Tianzhuo Chen, VALIE EXPORT. In their respective practices, the artists* dive below the surface and search for strategies and logics of resistance to break up power structures, to disrupt and challenge mechanisms of seeing and perception. The artistic works understand protest as a training program for the body, take patriarchal and colonial body images apart, or play with set pieces from the fitness industry and question them in the context of a neoliberal understanding of spirituality.
SOHO Studios
SOHO STUDIOS sind ein offener Ort für Kunst, Kultur und sozialen Austausch im Sandleitenhof, Wien-Ottakring.
Das Programm beinhaltet Ausstellungen, Performances, Werkzeuggespräche, Workshops, Geschichtenvormittage, Konzerte bei freiem Eintritt – mit speziellem Fokus auf kulturinteressiertes Publikum aller Generationen und die Nachbarschaft.
SOHO STUDIOS verfügen mit dem Kunstlabor, dem Freiraum und der kunstschule.wien über mehr als 800m2 Ausstellungsfläche und beherbergen sechs Ateliers. Die Räumlichkeiten der SOHO STUDIOS können auch gemietet werden.
The Gym
2 Nov 2022 - 4 Dec 2022
Liebknechtgasse 32, 1160 Wien, Österreich
credit: Peter Mayr