“Just Passing Through. Stopover Linz 09 Minutes”

Exhibition
Copyright: Kurt Groh / Linz09
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Press Conference
Monday 27 April 2009

The exhibition lampoons the city’s role as “European transportation hub” and spotlights some famous travelers’ transient relationships with Linz. Accounts and observations, notes jotted down in passing, and all sorts of records of travel adventures, experiences and chance encounters have been compiled into a highly polyphonic chorus of assessments, verdicts and prejudices on the subject of Linz. The contradictory testimony and declarations allow plenty of latitude for playful distance to the city’s (self)image. At the same time, they establish its place within the context of European intellectual history, but also relate smaller-scope narratives providing insights into the culture of travel itself.
Interspersed among the historical accounts as a sort of window on the here and now are artistic “commentaries” by a list of observers including VALIE EXPORT, Julius Deutschbauer/Gerhard Spring, Tex Rubinowitz, Herbert Achternbusch and Kurt Palm.

Ensconced in stylized coupés are famous passengers from various centuries, some making the journey alone, others with escort. The objects and images on display tell of their stays in Linz, their travel adventures and some of the traces Linz left in their oeuvre. The composition of the passenger list is strictly coincidental; after all, as Friedrich Hebbel, said: “Chance is the god of travelers.” In this spirit, Hans Christian Andersen makes the trip with Robert Musil, and Herbert Achternbusch with Theodor Herzl. Nikolaus Lenau, Johann Nestroy and Frances Trollope arrived by riverboat; Franz Grillparzer by stagecoach. Wilhelm Raabe praised the hotels of Linz. Karl Kraus, Georg Lukács and Helmut Qualtinger were on book tours. Hofmannsthal and Schnitzler occasionally stopped over on the way to their summer homes. Thomas Mann and Mark Twain, on the other hand, never even disembarked. Among the many others who passed through were those who managed to escape in the nick of time in 1938 and make their way from Vienna to the West.
The exhibition was curated by Evelyne Polt-Heinzl and designed by Peter Karlhuber.

WHAT // Exhibition opening - “Just Passing Through. Stopover Linz 09 Minutes”
WHEN // Tuesday, April 28, 2009, 7:30 PM
WHERE // StifterHaus, Adalbert-Stifter-Platz 1, 4020 Linz
About the exhibition: EVELYNE POLT-HEINZL
“Living Quotes”: GUNDA SCHANDERER, JOACHIM RATHKE
Special guest: PAUL STEPANEK
Exhibition run: April 29 to November 12, 2009
Opening hours: Tue & Wed 10 AM-3 PM; Thurs thru Sun 10 AM-6 PM

A project for Linz 2009 European Capital of Culture in cooperation with the StifterHaus