Curt Stenvert

The Austrian artist Curt Stenvert had already amassed a substantial oeuvre as a filmmaker and painter before he received international acclaim for his object art from 1962 onwards. Stenvert's approach involved a direct interaction between art and society, which he called »Functional Art«. Everyone should have direct access to his work and be able to think about the concepts and their meaning for their own lives. In contrast to the objects made by the Surrealists, which, by a defamiliarisation of the references, were charged with new, unknown meaning, Stenvert paves the way for an understanding of an »open work« (Umberto Eco).