New Head of Vienna's mumok Has Big Plans

More focus on the collection, new spatial concepts for the entrance area, and "radiating curiosity and hospitality": The mumok general director Fatima Hellberg, who has been in office since the beginning of October, has big plans for the black cube building in Vienna's MuseumsQuartier. However, the Hellberg era will truly begin on June 19, 2026, when the first exhibition - which will span the entire building - opens under the new director's leadership.

mumok Director Looked Back

Hellberg, born in Sweden in 1986 and previously director of the Bonn Kunstverein, recalled the founding spirit of the institution, which was established in 1962 as the Museum of the 20th Century and located at the current site of Belvedere 21, during her inaugural press conference on Friday: Openness, curiosity, and a sense of new beginnings were defining at the time, according to the general director. Hellberg aims to make this urgency palpable again - as well as "the connection between art and life."

Since the exhibition program has been planned by her predecessor Karola Kraus until the end of May next year, the successor can only start putting her stamp on the house from the summer - but then significantly: Hellberg has scheduled June 19, 2026, as the starting point for the new era. On that day, the exhibition "Terminal Piece" will open, in which many ideas of the newly appointed director are to be reflected.

The title refers to the installation of the same name by the US artist Kate Millett from 1972, which Hellberg has made her first acquisition in her new role and which will be on display in the exhibition. The feminist work can be interpreted as either a stage or a cage, depending on one's perspective, she says. In any case, it is important that it only functions in dialogue with the viewer. This fits well with Hellberg's approach, which is more about speaking with rather than about art.

"Walkable Total Experience"

All six floors of the building are to be featured in the opening exhibition, which will be staged as "acts" and is intended to create a "walkable overall experience with elements from theater and museum." Part of this is also a temporary redesign of the entrance area according to plans by the German stage and costume designer Anna Viebrock.

In doing so, "backstage and frontstage" are to be intertwined, thereby making hidden processes of museum life visible. "A museum is like an iceberg. Much remains hidden, only the tip is visible," explains Hellberg.

It is certain, however, that the general director, even after the grand opening exhibition, wants to explore "new ways of entrance design" together with artists to make the building more visible from the outside and to extend a kind of invitation to the audience. Hellberg calls this "panorama room." In addition to a focus on works by the Georgian artist Tolia Astakhishvili, "Terminal Piece" will primarily spotlight the museum's own collection, which consists of around 12,500 works - something the director intends to maintain thereafter.

First Personnel Decision

More details about the major exhibition will be revealed in January when the rest of the year's program is presented. However, Hellberg has already made a first personnel decision: She has brought Lukas Flygare, the previous head of collections and curator at the MMK (Museum of Modern Art) Frankfurt, to the mumok as deputy general director and chief curator to jointly implement the focuses in the museum.

This also includes the redesign of level -3. On one hand, a creative area for children will be created there, and on the other, a "quiet room" where a single artwork from the collection will invite intensive contemplation. Special building materials are intended to ensure that kids and silence are not contradictory.

(APA/Red)

This article has been automatically translated, read the original article here.