Our home for the weekend between the first and third of May was the Boutique Hotel Cortisen am See in St. Wolfgang, the first ART EMBASSY of Slovenia in Austria, under the patronage of the Embassy of Slovenia in Austria and Slovenian Cultural Information Centre SKICA VIENNA, supported by the main motivator behind the festival’s expansion into Austria, the hotel’s owner, Roland Ballner. Boutique Hotel Cortisen provided rooms and studios for artists from Slovenia: Borut Popenko, Maša Gala, Brane Širca, and Klemen Brun. Other artists have their homes for a week in the seven other hotels in St. Wolfgang.
This year, for the fourth time in Austria, ART CIRCLE hosts 22 artists from 15 countries. Since its beginnings in the Goriška Brda and the Vipava Valley in 2011, the ART CIRCLE international festival has brought its events to various regions across Europe. Festivals offer artists an intense and inspiring experience of creating art together with other international artists while connecting them with the local culture, people, and environment.
Artists had been settled in their studios in eight different hotels in St. Wolfgang, watching on Wolfgangsee. Nina Gospodin (Germany) had her studio in Hotel Cortisen am See in St. Wolfgang. Hotel Landhaus zu Appesbach was home to a studio space for Erik Weiser (Germany) and Ábel Szabó (Hungary). Strandhotel Margaretha hosted Weaam El Masry (Egypt) and Michael Kos (Austria). At Hotel Peter, Steven Wu (China) and Tanny Wu (China) stayed. Hotel Schwarzes Rössl hosted Andrea Kurtz (Croatia) and Murdo Ortiz (Spain). At Hotel Seehang, Vit Pavlik (Czech Republic) and Mehtap Özdemir (Turkey). At Hotel Seevilla, Vanessa Longo (Italy) and Sun Hee Moon (South Korea/Italy) spent time working and living in the garden and house. The studio at Hotel Weisses Rössl had Rose Wong (China) and SAKO (Japan/Mexico), Victoria Cozmolici (Moldova), and James Lang (England) as guests.
The first stop on our weekend was the top of the Schafberg mountain. Together with the artists, we took the Schafberg Railway up to the 1,783-meter-high summit of the Schafberg. Upon arrival, a breathtaking panorama opened before us: open space, the play of light, and mountain air, which makes you feel on top of the world. Artists were in groups working live on their canvases. In this special atmosphere, new works were created, inspired by the view, the moment, and the natural surroundings. We witnessed how making art transforms when it’s created collaboratively and collectively.
We walked the promenade next to the lake up to the old city center full of historical houses dating back to the 1500s, to the historical parish and pilgrimage church of St. Wolfgang. The earliest documented mention of the pilgrimage church, as a branch church of the Mondsee monastery parish, dates from 1183. The existence of a stone church is mentioned in a document from 1291. According to legend, the church was built by Bishop Wolfgang of Regensburg. Bishop Wolfgang of Regensburg arrived at the Benedictine monastery of Mondsee in 976 and then moved to the area around Lake Abersee (Wolfgangsee). Living as a hermit on Falkenstein Hill, he resolved to build a church. And this is how everything started. Centuries later, today the church is open to the public, and during the festival, it presented artworks, mostly paintings, placed in relation to the surroundings and made by participating artists.
On the second day, we visited all eight hotels and saw the working spaces of the artist; on our way, we met some hosts in the hotel. In the early evening, the closing of the residency program and the opening of the final exhibition at EQ by Schafberg Railway took place. Visitors, artists, and hosts were coming together one more time. Selected works, including works produced during the residence and also ones brought by the artist especially for the show, were on view.
The hall, usually hosting events of all kinds, on this occasion was an exhibition space with artworks presented in a dynamic display occupying the hall and leading you outside, all the way to the extended presentation in the workshop of the railway. The works on view are broad varieties of techniques. From the paintings in oil with a focus on landscape in works by Victoria Cozmolici, acrylic, and mixed media, also industry colors such as the ones in Maša Gala’s work, to the ones in mixed techniques focused on the legends of St. Wolfgang, painted by Rose Wong and James Lang, that lead even to sculptural works by Brane Širca and the ones by Michael Kos. There were reliefs and textiles in new works by Klemen Brun, who is often known for his charcoal drawings and large, colorful painting works. Sculptural formats by Jesse Magee, otherworldly-shaped ceramics by SAKO, and the ones full of texture by Andrea Kurtz, but also photo works and prints fixed on canvases in both Gala’s works and works by Murdo Ortiz, who also, by his placement of the paintings in an outside area, played with the sculptural scenery. Many images were made of fast and expressive movements, for example, the ones by Steven Wu, and some with a focus on the process of making and details, such as the ones by Vanessa Longo and Sun Hee Moon.
What unfolded within the presentation were various sensibilities and ways of production rich with new perspectives. The viewers were invited to come into communication with the artist and buy the works from them, with value defined and, after the successful sale, belonging fully to the artist. The festival makes a platform for the ultimate support of the artist, hosted by celebrating the region’s traditions, history, and landscape.
The Salzkammergut region is already well-known for the summer retreat tradition that has existed since the Habsburg times, and with the exquisite potential of the ART CIRCLE in the region. Every year brings new guests and new experiences for travelers, visitors, and locals and, more than anything else, makes memories that will never be forgotten!
See you next year!
Find out more about the locations and artists at www.artcircle.at, www.wolfgangsee.salzkammergut.at
ART CIRCLE is an international visual arts festival of KUD Manifest, a cultural association based in Slovenia that organizes art festivals, art residencies, and other cultural activities worldwide. It aims to connect professional artists with the international network, the diplomatic world, and the local community. Since its beginning in the wine region of Goriška Brda in Slovenia in 2011, The ART CIRCLE festival has expanded and offers events in other, contemporary artist-friendly regions. ART CIRCLE festivals offer artists an intense and inspiring experience of creating art together with many other international artists while connecting them with the local culture, people, and environment. www.artcircle.si
