VIENNA.- Kunstraum Niederoesterreich presents its annual exhibition program 2025—a year that marks the institution’s 20th anniversary.

Noisy tongues

Under the motto “Noisy tongues,” Kunstraum Niederoesterreich dedicates its 2025 program to various aspects of communication: from “noisy tongues” that polarize, divide, and pose an existential threat to democracy to types of noise with the potential to create connections.

The Kunstraum shifts the focus to forms of communication at the fringes and beyond language. Hoping that what leaks, murmurs, and vibrates bears world, we will delve into communicative liminal spaces, into ways of speaking and relating that elude the logic of conceptual communication and at the same time offer opportunities for contact and collectivity. Next to the exhibitions, there is an extensive live program along with a multifaceted, free-of-charge art mediation program, including body-focused formats.

As each year, Kunstraum Niederoesterreich will award the H13 Lower Austria Prize for Performance, the only prize for performance in Austria. In 2025, it will be awarded in partnership with Studio Voltaire in London. In addition to the prize money of 5,000 EUR, the H13 winner will undertake a residency at Studio Voltaire, which offers a wide range of opportunities for creative exchange and professional development.

Silent Spills I
March 14–April 26, 2025
Opening: March 13

The live exhibition Silent Spills I by performance artist and choreographer Deva Schubert is an intimate exploration of the porosity of the body as source of uncontrollable leaking, taboo thoughts, secrets and secretions. At the core of the project is a sound installation that Schubert will activate together with guest performers over the course of the show. Silent Spills is a coproduction by Kunstraum Niederoesterreich and donaufestival.

Artist: Deva Schubert
Curator: Frederike Sperling

Between the Tremor and a Murmur Lies a Sunset
June 6–July 26, 2025
Opening: June 5

Nature—a speaking subject? As we know, modern society has shown little interest in this idea. In many oral cultures, however, there is not only an awareness for nature’s eloquence but also a long tradition of communicative exchange with nature. This polyphonic conversation is at the heart of the group show Between the Tremor and a Murmur Lies a Sunset which investigates different possibilities of translation between human and nonhuman communication systems.

Artists: Orla Barry, Anca Benera & Arnold Estefan, Edgar Calel, Tania Candiani, Lorena Mal, Niamh O’Malley, ~pes (Elizabeth Gallón Droste & Pablo Torres)
Guest curator: Lorena Moreno Vera

On a tongue’s tip, at a world’s lip
September 3–November 8, 2025
Opening: September 2

Communicate quickly and effectively—that’s a central imperative of our time. Not for nothing do we get embarrassed or panic when we feel like we’re stumbling over our own message—stuttering, stammering, floundering, at a loss for words. On a tongue’s tip, at a world’s lip is an invitation to consider moments of speechlessness not as disruptions but rather opportunities: What other words—and worlds—lie hidden in the gaps in our communication?

Curators: Tjaša Pogačar & Frederike Sperling
Artists: Evelina Hägglund, Femke Herregraven, Miriam Kongstad, and more

20 years Kunstraum Niederoesterreich

Over the past two decades, Kunstraum Niederoesterreich has established itself as a respected address in Vienna. With its focus on time-based media, and performance in particular, it contributes to the vibrancy and diversity of the local art scene while promoting its role on the international stage. Together with friends and companions of the Kunstraum, we will trace the history of this special place in a variety of formats throughout 2025 and explore what the stories of the past 20 years hold for the present and future of the Kunstraum.