MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Conceptual artist"When the world falls apart, artists are needed to stand there with open wounds and show what is really happening. Artists are the oxygen of society."
(Marina Abramović)
Born on November 30, 1946, in Belgrade. From 1965 to 1970, she studied painting in Belgrade, and from 1973 onwards, she devoted herself to performance art. From 1973 to 1975, she taught at the Academy of Arts in Novi Sad. From 1992 to 1996, she was a professor at the University of Fine Arts in Hamburg, and from 1997 to 2004 in Braunschweig. From 1976 to 2005, she lived primarily in Amsterdam, then moved to New York. In 1976, she began her artistic collaboration and cohabitation with Ulay (Frank Uwe Laysiepen); they separated in 1988 and their last joint project was “Great Wall Walk.” From 2005 to 2009, she was married to Italian sculptor Paolo Canevari. Marina Abramović's performance art involves considerable physical exertion and sometimes existential risk. Since 2005, she has been exploring the reproducibility of performance art and the protection of originality and authenticity in the face of digitalization and interchangeability in cultural consumption.
In 2003, she founded the Independent Performance Group (IPG) in New York with the aim of promoting talented young performance artists. The non-profit organization was dissolved in 2007. In the same year, she purchased a theater in Hudson, New York. As part of a long-term project, it was converted and renovated by Rem Koolhaas' New York office OMA starting in 2013 to become the future headquarters of the Marina Abramović Institute (MAI). In 2011, she became an honorary member of the Royal Academy of Arts in London, and in 2012 she was appointed to the competition jury of the 69th Venice International Film Festival. In 2013, she became a member of the National Academy of Design, New York.
Awards (Selection)
2012 Lifetime Achievement Award, Podgorica, Montenegro
2011 Cultural Leadership Award, American Federation of Arts (AFA)
2009 Honorary doctorate from the University of Plymouth
2008 Austrian Decoration of Honour for Science and Art
2004 Honorary doctorate from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2003 Lower Saxony Art Prize
2003 Bessie Award
1997 Golden Lion, Venice Biennale
Performances (Selection)
2014 Long-term performance with the working title “512 Hours” at London's Serpentine Gallery, in which she—like the audience—completely avoided objects.
2010 Performance “The Artist is Present” im Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) New York, based on a concept by Klaus Biesenbach. During the exhibition's opening hours, Abramović sat silently at a table in the museum's atrium, facing a chair on which visitors could sit.
2005 “Seven Easy Pieces” at the Guggenheim Museum presented her own and other types of performance in partly revised versions (including ones by Acconci, Beuys, Export, Naumann).
2002 Performance “The House with the Ocean View” lasted 12 days and 12 nights in three rooms that were open at the front and visible to the audience..
1997 Video performance installation “Balkan Baroque” at the Venice Biennale. In addition to a video projection, the artist spent each day brushing fresh cattle bones while singing funeral songs from her homeland.
Solo exhibitions (Selection)
2019 The Cleaner. Palazzo Strozzi, Florence
2018 The Cleaner. Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Louisiana Museum of Modern Art; Bundeskunsthalle Bonn; Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna
2017 Abramovic Method for Treasures. The Royal Danish Library, Kopenhagen; Gallery Brandstrup, Oslo; Zuecca Project Space, Venice Biennale; Moderna Musset, Stockholm; Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna; Bröhan-Museum, Berlin
2016 As One, NEON+MAI. Benaki Museum, Athens
2013 Bob Wilson's The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic. Luminato Festival, Toronto
2012 Eight Lessons on Emptiness with a Happy End. The Műcsarnok/Kunsthalle Budapest
2012 The Abramovic Method. PAC, Milano
2008 Martian Museum of Terrestrial Art. Barbican Art Gallery, London
2008 Yokohama Triennale 2008 – Time Crevasse. Central and Waterfront Sites, Yokohama
2004 Loop Performance. (IPG) P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York,
1998 Marina Abramovic: Artist Body-Public Body. Kunstmuseum Bern
1998 Marina Abramovic: objects, performance, video, sound. Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney
1997 Ulay/Abramovic. Van Abbe Museum, Eindhoven
1997 Performing Body. Setagawa Art Museum, Tokyo
1995 Cleaning the Mirror (object installation and performance). Sean Kelly Gallery, New York
1994 Image of Happiness (extract of Delusional). Steirischer Herbst, Graz
1993 Dragon Heads (Performance). Caixa de Pensiones, Barcelona; Kunstmuseum Bonn; Kunsthalle Hamburg
1993 Wartesaal (Installation). Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin
1992 Biography. Kunsthalle Vienna
1991 The Lovers. Museum of Contemporary Art, Montreal
1990 The Lovers (objects and performances). Städtische Kunsthalle, Düsseldorf
1990 Marina Abramovic: Sur la Voie, Galeries Contemporaines. Centre Pompidou, Paris
1989 The Lovers. Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerpen
1982 Nightsea Crossing (Performance). Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam
1975 Rhythms 10;2;5;4;0. Museum für Zeitgenössische Kunst, Belgrad
Group exhibitions (Selection)
2013 Constellations. Tate Liverpool, Liverpool
2011 The Luminous Interval. Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao
2011 Heroinas. Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza y Fundacion Caja, Madrid
2008 Elles@centrepompidou. Centre Pompidou, Paris
2005 Balkan Erotic Epic. Sean Kelly Gallery, New York
2004 Biennial. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
2000 Video Time: Survey of…...The Museum of modern Art, New York
2000 Das Gedächtnis der Kunst. Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt
1995 Becoming Visible (video installation). Istanbul Biennale
1994 Hors Limites - L'Art et la Vie (mit Ulay). Centre Pompidou, Paris
1994 Beyond the Pale. Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin
1993 La Coesistenza dell'Arte. Venice Biennale
1992 documenta 9, Kassel
1992 Spatial Drive. The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York
1991 Arte Amazonas. Museo de Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro
1988 The Lovers: The Great Wall Walk (with Ulay)
1987 Art from Europe (with Ulay). Tate Gallery, London; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston
1984 Venice Biennale
1982 Vision of Disbelief: The 4th Biennal of Sydney (with Ulay). Art Gallery of New South Wales
1977/82/87 documenta 6, 7, 8 (with Ulay). Kassel
1976 Ambiente, Partecipazione/Strutture Culturali (with Ulay). Venice Biennale
Bibliography (Selection)
2018 Fischer, Jeannette: Psychoanalyst meets Marina Abramović. Zürich: Scheidegger & Spiess
2016 Abramović, Marina; Kaplan, James: Durch Mauern gehen. Autobiografie. Munich: Luchterhand
2008 Stiles, Kristine: Marina Abramović. Berlin: Phaidon
2003 Abramović, Marina; Laub, Michael: The Biography of Biographies. Mailand: Edizioni Charta