Partner Program
As always, the festival program of steirischer herbst is accompanied by a rich and varied Partner Program presented by local cultural institutions and artists. Twenty-one projects in Graz and Styria are part of this yearʼs festival.
Exhibitions
APORON 21
die prekARTe ’25
KUNST/ÜBER/LEBEN
prekARTe ’25 is: applied research into artistic strategies for surviving contemporary life in the slipstream of speculation, crises, and wars.
Camera Austria
Repeatedly failing to align with light
Repeatedly failing to align with light, a quote from a film by Luzie Meyer, refers to the use of visual disruptions and refractions. The failure to align with light alludes to the skepticism shared by the artists regarding the visual and its impact on perception, memory, and narration.
esc medien kunst labor
OUT OF CONTROL
Media artists are pioneers, also when it comes to dealing with artificial intelligence in a critical way and highlighting options for a fair and ethical approach—including the right not to be controllable or codable.
Forum Stadtpark
Possessed Mountains
Humans possess mountains. Mountains are possessed by humans. What curse is at work here? What symbolic, legal, and material types of proprietary possession are there? And how can we succeed in emancipating landscapes from the curse of ownership?
Grazer Kunstverein
Tom Burr
Paul
In Paul, Tom Burr engages with Pier Paolo Pasolini’s unrealized film on the life of Saint Paul. Burr takes up this figure—not as saint or martyr, but as a vessel of rupture, desire, and disorientation.
Graz Museum
Ins Ungewisse: Graz 1945–1965
After 1945, Graz lay in ruins—structurally, politically, and socially. The exhibition shows the arduous new beginning up to 1965. It tells of hope, change, and the path to democracy, encouraging reflections on the past and the present.
HDA – Haus der Architektur
Hermann Czech – Ungefähre Hauptrichtung
Hermann Czech is one of Austria’s most renowned architects. The exhibition shows a selection of his projects from the 1960s to the present day, conveys his theoretical work, and also highlights his critical engagement with the architectural avant-garde of the 1960s and the trigon biennial.
KULTUMUSEUM
Gott hat kein Museum | No Museum Has God
Where does religion actually figure in contemporary art? Fundamentalism is on the rise everywhere. Can quiet voices hold out against it? In nine sections, the KULTUM explores a gap in the current museum landscape that cannot be filled: a museum for God.
Kunsthaus Graz
Milica Tomić
On Love Afterwards
Milica Tomić’s solo exhibition On Love Afterwards addresses urgent questions of courage, memory, political violence, and social asymmetries. The performative approach of her works and that of the exhibition itself encourage visitors to actively engage with these issues.
Unseen Futures to Come. Fall
As individuals and as society, we are currently facing instability and change due to ecological crises, raging conflicts all over the world, and growing insecurity. When everything can be questioned, how can we preserve the belief in humanity as such?
QL-Galerie
Andrea Scrima
Loopy Loonies: Attempts at a Late-Capitalist Moral Philosophy
NO, EWWW, OWWW, EEEK: In a time characterized by multiple crises, the Loopy Loonies—Andrea Scrima’s body of drawings and texts—explore issues such as the abuse of language, the dulling of the senses through the media, moral ambivalence, and empathy.
Rhizom
Zentrum für Wurfkeramik
Temporäre Außenstelle Graz
Since 2019, the Zentrum für Wurfkeramik has been researching the method of throwing ceramics. Now, it is opening a temporary branch in Graz to provide insights into its archive, research, and instruments. Members of the center are personally available for questions.
< rotor > Zentrum für zeitgenössische Kunst
STRANCI: Vom Fremdsein
The exhibition unites artworks and artifacts related to Bosnia and Herzegovina through which the notion of the “foreigner” can be identified and elaborated. It focuses in particular on counterpolitical voices shaped by exile, emigration, and unresolved citizenship.
Schaumbad – Freies Atelierhaus Graz
After Laughter
“After laughter comes tears,” goes a song by the Wu-Tang Clan. Drawing upon Helmuth Plessner, the group exhibition deals with laughter and crying as moments in which we lose control, in which our bodies “speak.”
Performances
KRA
Mission Arnold Schwarzenegger
KRA saves the planet. Where others give up, we get started. Our headquarters: a garage. Our first target: cars—we terminate pollution. Like Arnold Schwarzenegger, terminator and climate hero. But: muscles, power, masculinity—seen too often, failed too often. KRA is taking over. Be part of our first action movie.
manuskripte
Die Exhumierung „Hödlmosers“
Eine literarchäologische Dokufiktion inkl. rituellem Brettljausnessen
In a literarchaeological expedition, manuskripte excavates Reinhard P. Gruber’s classic novel Hödlmoser, buried on the Zirbitzkogel in 1985. The performance, presented through cinematic docufiction and a ritual Brettljausnessen (cold platter), is meant to overcome the divide between folk and avant-garde culture.
OMAS GEGEN RECHTS & Friends
RÜCKwärtsParade
The retrograde performance through Herrengasse illustrates the tendency in society toward 1950s views of womxn and the family. A motley crowd of free people is transformed into a gray uniform mass. But it won’t stay that way.
Oper Graz
Dmitri Shostakovich
Moscow, Cheryomushki
Late-night legend Harald Schmidt guides us through Dmitri Shostakovich’s operetta Moscow, Cheryomushki, a musical firework display that playfully dissects the social ills of its time. A concert performance with the Graz Philharmonic, the Graz Opera Choir, and members of the ensemble.
Schauspielhaus Graz
Lorraine Hansberry
Les Blancs
In a fictional African country, three brothers not only have to come to terms with their family history, but must also address the colonial occupation of their homeland by the Whites. MoMo Matsunyane directs the German-language premiere of this play by civil rights icon Lorraine Hansberry.
Partners in Styria
Haus Lebt 2025
Wish You Were Here
Temporary cultural center
In a historic building, narratives of the past and visions of the future merge into a symbiotic present. Deep geological layers open up new spaces for thinking about time, continuity, and change and send visitors on a journey through layers of time.
Pavelhaus
how do you not lose history
Exhibition
Thirty years after Srebrenica and the end of the Bosnian War, the Pavelhaus aims to contribute to remembrance culture and its history. The exhibition focuses on a critical artistic investigation and a memory transfer related to this year’s commemorative events in Srebrenica.