Hans Haacke – Retrospective: Guided Exhibition Tour and Get Together in cooperation with Belvedere 21

Hans Haacke, Germania, German Pavilion, Venice Biennale, 1993 Courtesy the artist and Paula Cooper Gallery, New York © Hans Haacke / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / Bildrecht, Vienna 2025
In the course of a Get Together on June 3, we cordially invite you in cooperation with Belvedere 21 to a guided tour in English through the exhibition Hans Haacke – Retrospective. As the exhibition will close on June 9, this is one of the last opportunities to view this major solo show by one of the most internationally influential contemporary artists.
Hans Haacke (b. 1936) is a legend of political conceptual art—and his work remains strikingly relevant in today’s world. As a founding figure of artistic institutional critique, Haacke redefined the relationship between art and society and profoundly influenced generations of artists.
Beginning in the 1960s, Haacke first explored biological, physical, and ecological before shifting his focus to socio-political structures. His work unflinchingly addresses abuses of power, mechanisms of exclusion and inequality, historico-political disruptions; the entanglements of public institutions, politics, and economics, while also confronting anti-democratic tendencies.
This exhibition is an invitation to rediscover Haacke’s art and its relevance to the pressing questions of our time: How do capital, ideology, and history shape our lives? What images, rhetoric, and manipulative tactics does nationalist populism employ? How about the complicity of the art world, but also the critical potential of art? With a comprehensive selection from all periods, from 1959 to the present, the retrospective highlights the versatility of Haacke’s oeuvre. In addition to numerous iconic works, it includes in particular those projects that Haacke developed specifically for the Austrian context.
The exhibition is being held in cooperation with Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt.
Curated by Luisa Ziaja.
Assistant Curator: Katarina Lozo and Theresa Dann-Freyenschlag
Many thanks to Belvedere 21 for the cooperation.