Hans Haacke: Retrospective

Hans Haacke (b. 1936) is a legend of political conceptual art—and his work remains strikingly relevant in today’s world. As a founding figure of artistic institutional critique, Haacke redefined the relationship between art and society and profoundly influenced generations of artists.

Beginning in the 1960s, Haacke first explored biological, physical, and ecological before shifting his focus to socio-political structures. His work unflinchingly addresses abuses of power, mechanisms of exclusion and inequality, historico-political disruptions; the entanglements of public institutions, politics, and economics, while also confronting anti-democratic tendencies.

This exhibition is an invitation to rediscover Haacke’s art and its relevance to the pressing questions of our time: How do capital, ideology, and history shape our lives? What images, rhetoric, and manipulative tactics does nationalist populism employ? How about the complicity of the art world, but also the critical potential of art? With a comprehensive selection from all periods, from 1959 to the present, the retrospective highlights the versatility of Haacke’s oeuvre. In addition to numerous iconic works, it includes in particular those projects that Haacke developed specifically for the Austrian context.

The exhibition is being held in cooperation with Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt.