"Liquid Logic. The Height of Knowledge and the Speed of Thought" provides an insight into the current work of Elke Krystufek. Subjects that the artist has concerned herself with for years - the power and weakness of the female artist in the male-dominated art business, religion, control, fanaticism, and self sacrifice - are put in a new perspective of significance against the background of her exploration of the institutional self-definition of the museum; what is showing here is a complex œuvre drawing on various different sources. Known as a performance artist who has recurrently drawn discussion by self exposure as an artificial figure in different guises, Krystufek mainly presents new works in this exhibition. These are no less controversial than her previous work, but calmer and more reflected.

At different levels, Elke Krystufek confronts exhibition visitors with questions about the conservation of "values" and about "collecting eligibility". Whether she deals with the figure of artist Bas Jan Ader or designs furniture sculptures, or reconstructs her own kitchen at the MAK - she is always interested in the questionability of selecting criteria and in the alleged self-evidence that ensues from becoming canonical in an established art system. The semiotic quality inscribed in design objects and signs in general are called into question and, it seems, arbitrarily reinterpreted in her work, as selected collection items from the museum repository are assigned new meanings by placement in the exhibition context.

Premiered at the MAK will be the film Dr. Love on Easter Island, which is central to the exhibition. In the film certain objects from the exhibition reappear and which again addresses the artist's pivotal concerns. Different aspects that are thematic in the exhibition assemble into a whole, becoming something like the final pieces in the puzzle of the exhibition's overall concept. Produced by Stalker Film, Vienna

Exhibition Elke Krystufek, Peter Noever
Curator Tulga Beyerle

Catalogue Elke Krystufek. LIQUID LOGIC. The Height of Knowledge and the Speed of Thought, edited by Peter Noever, with contributions by Tulga Beyerle, Max Borka, Philippe Van Cauteren, Silvia Eiblmayr, Sebastian Hackenschmidt, Elisabeth Schmuttermeier, Johannes Wieninger as well as interviews of the artist with Heidemarie Caltik, Sebastian Hackenschmidt, Peter Noever, Kathrin Pokorny-Nagel, German/English, 224 pages, illustrations, Hatje Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern / MAK Vienna, 2006 MAK Design Shop

MAK Art Edition "Friendship Ring EQUILIBRIUM", Elke Krystufek, 2006; available at the MAK Design Shop