Daniel Spoerri

Daniel Spoerri is 80! The Kunsthalle Jesuitenkirche is the first exhibition centre in Europe to mark this occasion by honouring one of the most important international artists with an exhibition designed specially for the most profane sacred building. Spoerri´s international reputation is based primarily on his ‘snare pictures’, which appeared for the first time in the 1960s. With these pictures, he developed a new visual genre; objects found in chance positions, regardless of their location, are fixed exactly as they are, in the position in which they are found. Only their position in relation to the viewer is changed: the result is called a picture, horizontal becomes vertical. In addition to these works, which have long since found a place in the history of art, the exhibition and catalogue also include Spoerri’s large-scale sculptures: the ‘Prillwitz idols’, which he has been creating since 2005.