Hannes Egger, 7 Easy Exercises, 2021
Ph. Roberta Segata courtesy Centrale Fies
For his 40th birthday, on 22 December 2021, Hannes Egger donates his work “7 Easy Exercises” to visitors of art institutions. It is an “audience performance” in which a voice gives instructions to the audience and invites them to actively participate in the performance.
By performing the exercises, the audience not only undergo their own intimate, physical, and intellectual experiences but also place themselves and others present at centre stage. The artist sums up the experience of his audio performances with the slogan “The Artist is Absent – Perform yourself”: by activating the bodies of the audience members, their vital position in the exhibition context becomes clear, because what would an exhibition be without visitors? Is it not these very people who bring exhibitions to life through their presence, their physicality, their relationships, their intellectual connections, and their imagination? Can there even be exhibitions without visitors?
Hannes Egger 