Hermann Nitsch

A portrait of the Austrian avant-garde artist Otto Mühl/Muehl (1925-2013), whose work combined sex, violence, gastronomy and bodily effluence with unbridled abandon.

A short film by Maria Lassnig, shot in 1970.

Jonas Mekas assembles 160 portraits, appearances, and fleeting sketches of underground and independent filmmakers captured between 1955 and 1996. Fast-paced and archival in spirit, the film celebrates the avant-garde as its own “nation of cinema,” a vital community existing outside the dominance of commercial film.

Experimental film depicting military service in a grotesque way.

Introduces the films ‚Körperanalysen’ (body analyses), an overview of Actionism movies from 1964-1970 (a. o. Kurt Kren, Otto Mühl, Ernst Schmid Jr.), compiled and presented in a documentary format by Peter Kasperak.

“Before the eyes of all, at least of those present, the naked and direct exhibitions of the body take place with all its extensions; but the naked eye of the spectators who circle is promptly doubled by the many mechanical or electronic eyes of the photographic equipment and of the 'cameras' which, with their clicks and their tenacious buzzing, form the background” Renato Barilli

"Frauenmuskel is a jarring and sexually explicit film. Yet, the film holds an important dual sense of mystery that haunts long and after the film is over. Filmed during the Hermann Nitsch action of 1998, the film covers a stroll through the countryside as well as nightly impressions of the stars and clouds above Hermann Nitsch, himself" -Christopher May

A retrospective on Hermann Nitsch, Actionist and painter, composer and stage designer. He is one of the most renowned Austrian artists of today and nevertheless still divides the art world as before. Nitsch belongs beside Günter Brus, Otto Mühl and Rudolf Schwawrzkogler to the most important main actors of Vienese Actionism. At the beginning of the sixties he carried out his first 'Actions' in Vienna, which involved several trials and three terms of imprisonment. His main work, the "Orgy Mystery Theatre", inspired by Greek mythology, as well as by Antonin Artaud or Sigmund Freud, has been introducing, building up and carrying on all art forms since this time. The documentary includes a 4-hour overview of his Actions from 1962-2003, as well as an interview from 2005.