bankleer's sculpture ‘Umwölkt’ (“Beclouded”) refers in form and content to the plague column, which commemorates the overcoming of the plague epidemic of 1679 just a short distance away on the Graben. In the Trinity Column donated by Emperor Leopold I, the political and the theological, the earthly and the divine, merge into triumphant Baroque monumentality. bankleer take up the form of the ‘cloud obelisk’, which rises above the sturdy base of the plague column as a pyramid rising from the clouds, as well as its dramatic pictorial programme and bring both into the present day with a theatrical installation: once a week, actors climb inside the cloud that has descended to earth and perform in it for 15 minutes. In dialogue with each other and with the cloud, they think aloud about the suffering of the present, the division of society, wars and the rule of capitalism. What can be done to save the world in 15 minutes?

Numerous artists contributed to the planning and realization of the Plague Column (also known as the Trinity Column) in the 17th century. The monument was designed by Matthias Rauchmüller (1646-1686), who died during the work. The architectural concept goes back to Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, who modified the plinth started by Rauchmüller. The “cloud obelisk" (executed by several sculptors under the direction of Paul Strudel) goes back to a design by the Venetian architect, graphic artist and stage designer Lodovico Ottavio Burnacini, one of the most important ‘theatre engineers’ of the Baroque period, whose artistic spectrum ranged from depictions of everyday life to ‘grotesques’ and fantastic visions of hell.

bankleer dedicates its specific interest to this cross-genre approach of the High Baroque for its installation on the Vienna Graben and combines it with its own way of working. The artist duo creates ‘performative sculptures’ by working in an interdisciplinary way at the boundaries between sculpture, performance, text and video: ‘For us, art is a practice for responding to social, political and historical events. In an interdisciplinary and multi-perspective way, we operate at the boundaries between situational sculpture, performance, text and video’ (bankleer).