Erwin Wurm, Wurscht

Wurscht, 2017

Silicone, chip, paint silicone, ca. 10.5 × 5 × 2.5 cm

Edition of 100

Created on the occasion of the exhibition Erwin Wurm. Football-sized lump of clay on light blue car roof, Kunsthaus Graz, March 24 – August 20, 2017.

The curator Günther Holler-Schuster in conversation with Erwin Wurm about the Wurscht:

Günther Holler-Schuster: For the exhibition, a special edition has been created by you: an annual pass for the Joanneum in the form of a knackwurst. If someone then turns up at the ticket counter with this object, it’s like with many of your works: one finds oneself in an absurd, almost embarrassing situation and turns into sculpture oneself. Just imagine: someone arrives at the museum counter and the person opposite him fails to recognize the sausage as an entrance ticket. One just hopes that the person is not going to call for the police straightaway. A horror scenario unfolds.

Erwin Wurm (laughs): Exactly. The sausage is a Central European icon, a food icon. After all, we’re in winterland here, where there was nothing to eat in the cold season, no fresh fruit or vegetables. Sauerkrauf was pickled, as were gherkins, old meat was stuffed into intestines and became sausage. Food for winter. So that’s how I get to the sausage at all. And then of course every gherkin, every sausage has a particular form that reminds us of male parts, and this anatomical part is something very important for the man, and for the woman, after all. That’s a theme for drama and for world wars, and all that. So this theme interests me, and therefore it crops up repeatedly.

Vienna, February 3, 2017

The Wurscht gives free admission to all exhibitions of the Universalmuseum Joanneum, valid for one year starting from the activation at the info desk at Kunsthaus Graz.

Price: 199 €    
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