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Avant-Garde and Liberation: Contemporary Art and Decolonial Modernism
7th June -  22nd September 2024
Museum of Modern Art, Ludwig Foundation, Vienna

We are thrilled that work by Maud Sulter will be seen at the Museum of Modern Art, Ludwig Foundation, in Vienna, as part of the exhibition Avant-Garde and Liberation, which highlights the significance of global modernism in contemporary art. 

The exhibition will include the famed series Les Bijoux (2002-2006), a series of nine large-format Polaroid photographs loaned by The Estate of Maud Sulter, plus a display of archival materials relating to Maud Sulter’s multi-media installation Hysteria (1990-1991). The archival material is drawn from Estate of Maud Sulter and Street Level Photoworks, and is curated by Deborah Cherry (Professor Emerita, Art History and Theory, Central St Martins, University of the Arts London) and Malcolm Dickson, Director of Street Level Photoworks. Hysteria was shown at many venues at the turn of the 90s, including Street Level Photoworks in 1992 and a selection was included in the 2015 retrospective exhibition Passion, curated by Deborah Cherry, Ajamu, and Street Level.  

Avant-Garde and Liberation raises questions of the political circumstances that move contemporary artists to resort to non-European avant-gardes that formed a counterpart to the dominant Western modernism from the 1920s onwards. The exhibition hints at the hidden narratives around decolonial avant-gardes in Africa, Asia, and the “Black Atlantic” region, and purports to take a stand against current forms of racism, fundamentalism, and neocolonialism. The exhibition aims to reflect on questions of temporality as well as the possibility of engaging with old and new liberation movements.

Featuring work by:
Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc, Omar Ba, Radcliffe Bailey, Yto Barrada, Mohamed Bourouissa, Diedrick Brackens, Serge Attukwei Clottey, william cordova, Atul Dodiya, Robert Gabris, Jojo Gronostay, Leslie Hewitt, Iman Issa, Janine Jembere, patricia kaersenhout, Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński, Zoe Leonard, Vincent Meessen, The Otolith Group, Fahamu Pecou, Cauleen Smith, Maud Sulter, Vivan Sundaram, and Moffat Takadiwa.

The exhibition is curated by Christian Kravagna, co-curated by Matthias Michalka.