Kunsthalle Wien

Kunsthalle Wien presents the first exhibition in Austria by Guglielmo Castelli (b. 1987, Turin). The exhibition at Karlsplatz comprises an entirely new body of work including painting, sculpture and a site-specific mural. Trained in theatrical scenography, Castelli has developed a distinctive iconography that draws upon the history of painting, architecture and literature. His compositions are characterised by an earthy, nocturnal palette and a fluid, dreamlike quality that is often difficult to locate in space and time. Sweet Baby Motel presents seven paintings on canvas, each centred on a single figure who often appears weightless or enigmatically suspended in space. Limbs bisect compositions, imitating or morphing into scissors, both a recurrent motif and artistic tool within Castelli’s practice. Spotlit and costumed with harlequin prints, tights, puffed sleeves, gloves and ruffs, his subjects resemble the characters of a theatrical production, caught in a moment of reverie or quiet contemplation. Glimpses of Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s The Hunters in the Snow (1565) or a patchwork of façades that recall the architecture of Friedensreich Hundertwasser add a Viennese accent to these compositions which are installed upon a 22-metre-long painted mural especially conceived for this exhibition. Inspired by the German fairytale Hansel and Gretel, it unfolds in the style of a story book, while remaining conscious of the movement and gaze and the different perspectives available within the space. At the centre of the mural, where the feet of the two protagonists meet, Castelli depicts an upturned gingerbread house, questioning preconceived narratives around hierarchy and control. The exhibition is accompanied by a new publication featuring texts by Sarah Crowe and Lillian Davies, as well as an interview with the artist by Francesco Manacorda. Published by Lenz, Castello di Rivoli and Kunsthalle Wien, the publication will be available from the end of March. The exhibition is organised in collaboration with Castello di Rivoli Museo d‘Arte Contemporanea, Rivoli-Turin.

Kunsthalle Wien presents a major survey of works by Richard Hawkins (b. 1961, Mexia, Texas), bringing together over 100 paintings, collages, sculpture and videos from nine distinct bodies of work produced over the last three decades. It is the first institutional exhibition of Hawkins’s work in over a decade and the first in Austria. Since the early 1990s, Hawkins has developed a singular practice based upon the intense pleasure of looking and the dynamics of desire. Employing collage as a means to structure and develop his compositions, he has described his work as ‘promiscuously referential’, quoting from the histories of artistic representation in sculpture, painting, literature and the performing arts alongside popular culture. The exhibition surveys a period that begins with meticulously annotated compositions of cut and pasted imagery and shows the breadth of Hawkins’s output, including ceramic reliefs, wallpapers and videos that allude to online subcultures and shared memes. The title Potentialities borrows an ancient concept from Western philosophy and science that describes any ‘possibility’ that a thing can be said to have. The exhibition is accompanied by a new publication, the first on Richard Hawkins in over 15 years. It features essays by Rhea Anastas, Annie Ochmanek and Kristian Vistrup Madsen, as well as a conversation between Richard Hawkins and Bruce Hainley. Richard Hawkins has created a limited edition print as part of a new series of artists’ editions. Purple Melody Vienna (2025) reproduces the 2018 painting Purple Melody included in the exhibition. Trigger warning The exhibition contains nudity, body horror and explicit sexual imagery.

Kunsthalle Wien presents the first solo exhibition outside France by the French-Iranian artist Chalisée Naamani (b. 1995, Paris). Entitled Octogone, the exhibition includes a series of new commissions alongside recent sculpture, print and textile works. Naamani describes her sculpture as ‘image-garments’, produced via a process of layering and collaging images, fabrics and text from diverse sources. While her objects often resemble items of clothing or refer to the history of fashion, they are never intended to be worn. Instead, her sculpture positions fashion as inherently political, drawing upon the applied arts to reveal how questions of form, function and aesthetics are bound to power and cultural meaning. Informed by a wide range of sources, Naamani’s works bring together ornamental traditions from the decorative and fine arts, Persian and Christian iconographies, quotations from popular culture and the internet as well as personal photographs and archival material. Several sculptures engage – both formally and symbolically – with the visual language of international protest movements and political resistance, envisioning garments as potential carriers of emancipation. From Iran (2025), for instance, refers to the protests against the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which are in turn associated with the initiative ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’, formed in response to the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody in 2022. Elsewhere, Cape et gilet jaune (2020) cites the clothing of the French protest group ‘Gilets Jaunes’ [Yellow Vests], whose very name originates from a high-visibility garment, combing functional with political needs. This engagement continues with the newly commissioned sculpture No Kings, Only Queens (2026), which addresses the recent struggles for trans rights in the United States of America, and Liberty Leading the People (2026), titled after Eugène Delacroix’s painting La Liberté guidant le people (1830), which still serves as an iconic image for revolutionary aspirations long after the French July Revolution. Central to Naamani’s practice is the dissemination of images and symbols that accompany these movements and the processes of translation they undergo – historically and within today’s condition of constant reproduction and appropriation via social media. At the same time, the works trace the cultural circulation of images and garments within a globalized world, shaped by migration, tourism and the networks of production, display and consumption that shape the fashion industry. The title and design of the exhibition refer to the Zurkhaneh [House of Strength]: In Iran and neighbouring countries, this training space features an octagonal ring and is dedicated to the practice of Varzesh-e Pahlavani, a martial art rooted in the pre-Islamic period. Following the Arab conquest of Iran in the seventh century, the sport was banned due to its perceived revolutionary potential as a form of cultural and physical resistance. Naamani’s exhibition and its scenography (resembling a changing room with lockers and mirrors) intersects this aspect of Iran’s cultural history with that of the artist’s family. She refers to her grandfather who practised the sport and appears in a black-and-white photograph wearing his medals, which are embroidered onto capes modelled on traditional training attire within the installation Who claims love (2025). More recently, the practice of Varzesh-e Pahlavani – long dominated exclusively by men – has been claimed by women in the context of emancipatory movements in Iran. Chalisée Naamani has created a scarf as part of Kunsthalle Wien’s series of artists’ editions. It takes the form of a football scarf with the slogans ‘Free Britney’ and ‘Free Iran’. The exhibition is organised in collaboration with Palais de Tokyo, Paris.

Sophie von Hellermann (b. 1975, Munich) has created an extensive new work on canvas for the 62-metre vitrine on the south-west wall of the Kunsthalle’s building. Von Hellermann’s paintings quote fact and fiction, drawing diversely from history and culture to develop expansive, narrative compositions. Using broad-brushes to apply acrylic and raw pigment on unprimed canvas, her images are imbued with a luminosity and a sense of movement and weightlessness that contributes to their fleeting, dream-like or cinematic quality. Get Your Head Around It combines subjects from natural sciences with references to the history of philosophy and culture taking inspiration from its location and proximity to institutions such as Vienna’s Natural History Museum. It pays tribute to the writer, cybernetician, language theorist and musician Oswald Wiener (b. 1935, Vienna; d. 2021, Steiermark) with whom von Hellermann studied Erkenntnistheorie [epistemology] while at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in the 1990s. Motifs include the Baum der Erkenntnis [Tree of Knowledge], the cave paintings at Lascaux and Plato’s speleological allegory. A pair of black and white swans make a passing reference to the Viennese philosopher Karl Popper and his theory of Kritischer Rationalismus [Critical Rationalism]. The end of the frieze references Wiener's concept for a ‘Bio-Adapter’ first described in his novel die verbesserung von mitteleuropa [The Improvement of Central Europe]. This cybernetic apparatus would facilitate the transfer of consciousness to electronic circuits while allowing the body to decompose, offering ‘a complete solution of all world problems’. The commission is von Hellermann’s first solo exhibition in Austria. The artist also supports the Kunsthalle Wien’s edition series with 13 unique watercolours.