Tag: austrian art

“My 1st action [Versumpfung einer Venus , 1963] was based on the idea of integrating the human body in a

sculpture. Instead of the bulky material used to make the junk sculptures I now mainly worked with soft materials

such as cooking oil, margarine, tomatoes, raspberry juice, milk, whipped cream, eggs sunny side up, raw eggs,

flour, semolina, meat, vegetables, cacao, oranges, ground chocolate, marmalade, cream, peas, cucumbers, fish,

insulating bands, strings, towels, skin cream, dust paint, paste and water. The creative process became increasingly

foregrounded, there was no more final point. The picture and the sculpture had become superfluous. I called

these staging’s with bodies and materials ‘material actions’.”

– Otto Muehl, in: Aktionismus – Aktionsmalerei 1960-65, exhibition catalogue, ed. Peter Noever / MAK, Vienna

1989, p. 26