For a new edition of her project series Wandertag, curator Nora Mayr invited the artists Martin Chramosta, Jojo Gronostay and Christiane Peschek to select special locations in Vienna and develop artistic interventions for them. The projects - which take place in a bathhouse, a shopping street, a federal administrative court - open up unusual views of Vienna. Nora Mayr borrows the title Wandertag from the common vocabulary used in schools, where these excursions signify a break from the daily routine, and in Vienna, a prospect of adventure in one's own city. In this sense, the interventions invite visitors to break out of patterns of movement, to change the usual pace of being in the city, and to experience art and neighborhoods in a new way.

Wandertag was conceived by Nora Mayr during the Covid-induced lockdown, when outdoor space seemed to be one of the few places for safe interpersonal interaction as well as a physical experience of art. During this time, the project emerged as a result of curatorial exploration and an understanding of public space as a "new retreat and rediscovered venue for art," according to Mayr.

In 2021 Wandertag started with projects by the artists Julischka Stengele, Lukas Thaler, Marianne Vlaschits as well as Anna Witt and will enter a second round in 2023.

Wandertag #5: CHRISTIANE PESCHEK - Guided Tour & Bathhouse Experience, April 1, 2023 / Augmented-Reality-Sculptures in the outdoor area of the Sargfabrik, April 1 until May 31, 2023

"For several years, Christiane Peschek's artistic work has explored connections and boundaries between digital and analog bodies. She explores the potential of digital self-representation as a form of self-care, she tests in so-called "post-body spas" how our extended virtual existence can experience recovery, or creates intimate, performative stagings for physical regeneration.

For Wandertag #5 Christiane Peschek takes her participants to the 14th district of Vienna and includes both the interior and the exterior of the Sargfabrik Wien in her artistic work. With a focus on digital experience, the artist develops three Augmented-Reality-Sculptures in the outdoor area that interweave with the architecture of the housing project and become digital images of fluid, billowing bodies with skin- and bone-like surfaces on the viewers' cell phones. The objects are complemented by an audio collage that, accessible via the Wandertag website, gathers instructions on the topic of relaxation.

In contrast to that, Peschek stages a one-day, multi-sensory spa experience in the bathhouse of the Sargfabrik away from the digital realm. An extensive transformation of the interior space creates an oasis with amorphous sculptures that spray selected relaxation essences, a water basin with sound waves and water pearls that caress the bodies of the participants." - Nora Mayr

The three stations in the outdoor space of the Sargfabrik can be walked independently. The positions of the Augmented-Reality-Sculptures can be found on the Wandertag website starting on April 1, 2023.

Wandertag #6: MARTIN CHRAMOSTA - Guided Tours, May 3 and May 7, 2023 / Sculptures in the outdoor area of the Erdberg Federal Office Building, May 3 until May 7, 2023

Forgotten Kunst am Bau projects were the focus of Martin Chramosta's explorations through Vienna. He found what he was looking for at the Erdberg Federal Office Building in Vienna's third district: In the large-scale courtyard of the Kafkaesque building complex (built 1978-1987), the densely packed sculptures by artist Robert Herfert appear as if they have been set aside and left behind - between ashtrays and trash cans, people waiting, groups of students, or passers-by.

Chramosta's artistic intervention is based on this peculiar in-between space: he calls his objects "Gehäuse", which, distributed across the courtyard and garden, formally recall functional outdoor furniture, only to break out of this impression again. They are assemblages for which the artist combines materials found in the surroundings with references to the architecture of the building, creating fields of tension between the past and the present, the monumental and the sketchy, the auratic and the everyday.

The individual stations of the tour can be found on the Wandertag website starting on May 3, 2023. Martin Chramosta's sculptures can be found in the inner courtyard (access via Erdbergstraße 192-196) and in the garden (Markhofgasse 21, to the left of the parking garage) of the Erdberg Federal Office Building.
The garden of the building is open from Wednesday to Friday between 07:00 am and 03:30 pm. During this period, access is possible via the parking garage. Outside these hours, the intervention in the garden can be viewed from the sidewalk in Markhofgasse through the fence. The courtyard is open at all times.

Wandertag #7 : JOJO GRONOSTAY - Guided Tours, June 23 and July 1, 2023 / Temporary Interventions on the Meidlinger Hauptstraße, June 21 until July 2, 2023

For nearly two weeks, Jojo Gronostay interferes with the visual space of Meidlinger Hauptstraße. Under the title An impressionistic travel journal, he stages an artistic form of an advertising campaign on the shopping street: signs fixed to street lamps display black-and-white photographs of perfume bottles, combined with fragmented advertising slogans from the perfume world. With the perfume, Gronostay puts the focus on a product that stands for luxury. Comparable to the volatility of a fragrance, the project eludes a single interpretation and opens up the game for multiple associations.

In his work, Jojo Gronostay explores the boundaries between fashion, consumption, and art and investigates the political and economic structures between the formerly colonized countries of Africa and the so-called Western world. His photographs show perfume bottles assembled into sculptures, which come from private individuals in the 12th district. In their alienation, the forms are reminiscent of African sculptures from the early 20th century in Europe. Like portraits of a bygone world, the minimalist photographs interweave with poetic statements around desire, longing, and seduction. The collaged, English advertising slogans appear in Meidlinger Hauptstraße, affectionately known as MeiHau, multilingual in keeping with the population of the 12th district.

The individual stations of the walk can be walked independently and can be found on the Wandertag website from June 21, 2023.