PARIS.- The "Hans Hollein transFORMS" exhibition provides a better understanding of the coherence between the creative and critical approaches of Austrian architect Hans Hollein (1934-2014).


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It showcases his most iconic pieces which themselves reflect research spanning over half a century.

Today, the view of his “style” as postmodern deserves further study in light of his involvement in the various movements that shaped the post-avant-gardism of the 1960s to 1980s, ranging from Informalism to Conceptualism and the Radical Architecture movement.

In 1987, the Centre Pompidou devoted a significant exhibition to Hollein in the Forum, and after he passed away, the Centre Pompidou - Musée National d’Art Moderne acquired a vast collection in 2016, including installations, models, drawings and documentation on all aspects and covering all periods of his work.

With his first research into the concept of space (1958-1962) and on architecture sculpture in Austria and the United States, followed by the ‘Architektur’ exhibition with Walter Pichler (Galerie Nächst St. Stephan, 1963) and his collages on urban scale (now at the MoMA), the first phase of his work links in closely with Conceptualism, especially through his participation in the catalogues and exhibitions devoted to this movement.

From 1965 onwards, he played an active role in editing Bau magazine in Austria, while still working on noteworthy exhibitions including ‘Austriennale’ (Triennale di Milano, 1968), ‘MAN transFORMS’ (Cooper-Hewitt Museum in New York, 1976) and installations such as Die Turnstunde (Städtisches Museum Abteiberg in Mönchengladbach, 1984). His international reputation was confirmed by the creation of his iconic façade featuring a series of columns, for the founding exhibition of postmodernism ‘La Strada Novissima’ at the 1980 Venice Biennale.

After designing several shops, including Retti (1966) and Schullin I and II (1974-1976), Hollein worked on a large number of architectural projects in Austria, such as the Haas Haus (1990) opposite St. Stephan cathedral in Vienna’s main square, and on some major creations further afield such as the Museum Abteiberg in Mönchengladbach (1982), the Museum of Modern Art in Frankfurt (1991), and Vulcania (2002) in Auvergne, France.

Three questions for Frédéric Migayrou, exhibition curator

The exhibition is drawn from the Centre Pompidou collection, which includes 173 works by Hans Hollein. How did you choose the works to present in the exhibition?

Though all the works were already in the collection of the Centre Pompidou − Musée National d’Art Moderne, a new acquisition in 2016 featured a series of installations created for exhibitions in which Hans Hollein participated most often as an artist, but also contained many experimental drawings and architectural projects, including several models.

Hans Hollein is internationally recognised as an architect, but he has been invested in an artistic practice from the beginning, at first close to informalism, then conceptual art, participating in key demonstrations of this movement. This exhibition presents multiple major installations for the first time since their creation, such as the work created for the Venice Biennale of Contemporary Art in 1972 or The Gymnastics Lesson (1984). The exhibition is organised into 13 sections or “stations” that mark the stages of development of Hans Hollein's work, whether with an artistic approach or as an architect, driven by a conceptual understanding of creation. Hans Hollein’s approach anticipated what amounted to a crisis of modernist rationalism and representation in the post-war period, announcing the arrival of post-modern and deconstructivist movements in architecture.

Why do you consider it important to show Hans Hollein’s work in 2025?

The Centre Pompidou previously dedicated an exhibition to him in 1987, in co production with other museums, but mainly from the perspective of his work as an architect, even if several of his installations were exhibited. Since then, new publications have covered his work, and more direct access to the archives has made it possible to retrace his entire career, in a coherent dialogue with the most important movements and creators of the 20th century.

Hans Hollein is a multifaceted creative: artist, architect, exhibition curator, designer, set designer, but also theorist and coeditor of the Bau magazine, where he advocated for a reevaluation of Josef Hotfmann and Adolf Loos’ works. It is through this transdisciplinary position that we must understand his work, which, beyond his major architectural projects (Mönchengladbach Museum, Museum für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt, Haas Haus, Vulcania, etc.), defined a unique aesthetic and critical positioning. This perspective goes beyond the only international recognition brought by his participation in the 1980 Venice Biennale, where he defied the history of architecture. Hans Hollein’s work, which accompanied the last avant-garde movements of the 20th century, is therefore worth being rediscovered, to allow for a critical look at this recent history.

Hans Hollein is an architect and yet, we are often tempted to categorise him as an artist. What relationship did he have with his work? How did he define himself?

When graduating from Berkeley in 1960, Hans Hollein revealed a work combining sculptures and drawings, in line with the informalism and expressionism of Franz Kline or Hans Hartung. His collaboration with Walter Pichler, particularly through the creation of collages that would directly influence Claes Oldenburg, then his proximity with Joseph Beuys, testify to his engagement as an artist. From his openly conceptual works, like the photographs produced in 1964 and understood as nonarchitectures, to the creation of complex installations like in Mönchengladbach in 1970 or the Venice Biennale in 1972, Hollein was fully integrated into the artistic field.

His involvement went as far as organising the “MAN transFORMS” exhibition, designed in close collaboration with Arata Isozaki and Ettore Sottsass. This exhibition was imagined as a huge collaborative installation and resembles an archaeology of thecontemporary industrial world. It was through this project that Hollein defined himself as a “conceptualizer”.

Exhibition path

If the Austrian Hans Hollein (1934–2014) is widely recognized as an architect, his work extends far beyond this field. As an artist, theorist, designer, and exhibition curator, he embodied a total commitment to all areas of creation, staying true to his manifesto, "Everything is Architecture."

At the turn of the 1960s, his early research on space and architecture, along with his collages exploring urban structures, brought him closer to Informal Art, Conceptual Art, and Radical Architecture. From 1965 onward, he became actively involved in editing the Bau magazine and multiplied his contributions to highlight the psychophysical and cognitive dimensions of architecture. He conceived major exhibitions such as “Austriennale” and ”MAN transFORMS”, as well as installations like Die Turnstunde (1984), revealing a continuous reflection on form, its permanence, and its transformations.

The creation of his iconic façade for the founding exhibition of postmodernism, the Strada Novissima, at the Venice Biennale in 1980, solidified his international reputation. However, his association with this “style” deserves to be reconsidered in light of his participation in various movements that shaped the post-avant-garde.

Hollein’s early works, such as the Retti (1965) and Schullin I (1974) boutiques in Vienna, as well as the museums in Mönchengladbach (1982) and Frankfurt (1991), paved the way for numerous large-scale projects, including the Haas Haus (1990) in Vienna and the Vulcania park (2002) in Auvergne.

1 - Informal art

Hans Hollein graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna and continued his studies in the United States, most notably at Berkeley. In 1960, he presented his dissertation in the form of an exhibition titled “Plastic Space: space in space in space”, featuring plaster sculptures in composite forms. These works, in dialogue with his free verse poems, shaped the environment and played with the tension between fullness and emptiness. Hollein was less interested in structure than in sensory qualities of space. On his return to Austria in the 1960s, he joined the Viennese art scene based around Otto Mauer, a Catholic priest and director of the avant-garde gallery Nächst St. Stephan. Hollein was critical of modernist architecture, which he considered too rationalist and disconnected from human needs. In his lecture ”Zurück zur Architektur“ [Back to Architecture], he called for a more intuitive architecture, free from the constraints of functionalism.

2 - Hans Hollein – Walter Pichler

In 1962, Hans Hollein met Viennese artist Walter Pichler at a lecture at the Nächst St Stephan gallery. Together, they presented the exhibition ”Architektur: work in progress“ in 1963 and established a dialogue between their research around two themes: the archaic, source of the origins of architecture, and the technological, as a response to human needs.

They advocated for ”pure and absolute” architecture, free from technical, aesthetic and utilitarian constraints. Developing new visual strategies, they juxtaposed images to create new architectural typologies, such as aircraft carriers, Mexican ruins and oil rigs.

Hollein’s abstract drawings reduce his discipline to archetypal symbols. His model of an ”urban macrostructure“ blurs the boundaries between sculpture and urban planning. The exhibition foreshadowed the Viennese radical scene of the years to follow.

3 - Photomontages – Conceptual art

The 1967 “Architectural Fantasies“ exhibition at MoMA in New York showcased young Austrian architects such as Hans Hollein, Raimund Abraham, and Walter Pichler. Influenced by Pop Art, Hollein showcased photomontages that subvert the technical conception of architecture by assembling images from magazines with photos of landscapes. With Monument to Victims of the Holocaust and Aircraft Carrier City in Landscape, he disrupts visual conventions and questions the role of architecture as a means of communication, resonating with Marshall McLuhan’s media theory.

In a move to dematerialize his discipline, Hollein also shared affinities with conceptual art. He contributed to exhibitions that founded this movement, such as “Information” at MoMA (1970), “Situations/Concepts” in Vienna (1971), and “Raüme. Beleg III” in Mönchengladbach (1976), alongside major artists such as Sol LeWitt, Daniel Buren, and Joseph Kosuth.

4 - Environmental control

In his manifesto ”Alles ist Architektur“ [Everything is Architecture] (1968), Hans Hollein extended the concept of architecture to the point of defining it as a simple mental process. Drawing on technological advances, he otfered applications to enhance the sensory experience.

For the 1965 Paris Biennale, he designed an Environnement minimal (Minimal environment): a modest telephone box incorporating the functions of a home, where telecommunication extends the space beyond its physicality. For an extension to the University of Vienna (1966), he reduced the building to a simple television set. Hollein also explored immateriality with projects such as Svobodair (1968), an aerosol can to improve the otfce environment, and the Non Physical Environmental Control Kit (1967), pills otfering various sensory experiences. These reflections culminated in Mobiles Büro [Mobile Office] (1969), an inflatable capsule used as an otfce, illustrating the flexibility of the modern architect, nomadic and self-employed.

5 - Austriennale. 14th Milan Triennale, 1968

In 1968, Hans Hollein designed the Austrian pavilion for the 14th Milan Triennale. Inspired by writer Franz Kafka, psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud and contemporary media theory, he placed visitors in situations that disrupted their senses and perception. The use of primary colours and materials such as aluminium gave the ensemble a pop aesthetic, contrasting with the prison-like aspects of the installation. The pavilion was made up of a series of corridors, some leading to dead ends or staircases to nowhere. One corridor narrowed according to the demographic curve, symbolising urban pressure, while another was filled from floor to ceiling with administrative files. The experience was interrupted by doors with multiple handles, chilly passages and curved walls that made it difficult to walk around. Visitors were invited to wear glasses with lenses in the colours of the Austrian flag, which change their perception. The allegorical journey demonstrated the mechanisms of alienation in mass society.

6 - MAN transFORMS, Cooper-Hewitt Museum, New-York, 1976

The ”MAN transFORMS“ exhibition, organised in October 1976 to mark the opening of the new Cooper-Hewitt Museum in New York, established a dialogue between everyday life and the museum collection. Hollein’s ambition was to rethink the understanding of design by detaching it from a linear historical and aesthetic narrative, to illustrate its role in structuring the human environment. In collaboration with a dozen architects and designers, including Buckminster Fuller and Ettore Sottsass, he designed an immersive exhibition. Using ordinary items such as hammers, bread and stars, he created installations that explored the multiplicity of forms and functions that a single object can take. These variations highlighted the collective dimension of design, modulated by ditferent cultural and religious contexts. The exhibition did not link isolated objects, but rather ideas and practices, inviting visitors to make their own interpretation.

7 - Everything is Architecture, an Exhibition on the Theme of Death. Städtisches Museum Mönchengladbach, 1970

The exhibition ”Alles ist Architektur. Eine Ausstellung zum Thema Tod“ [Everything is Architecture. An Exhibition on the Theme of Death], presented in 1970 at the Städtisches Museum in Mönchengladbach, explored the relationship between architecture and death. Close to the ideas of German artist Joseph Beuys, Hans Hollein used a funerary lexicon to reveal the spiritual dimension of the material world. He invited visitors to consider the mediums of memory and ritual through tombs, ruins and everyday objects raised to the rank of relics. In a room with a sand-covered floor, contemporary artefacts hidden under mounds were unearthed by the public, becoming archaeological artefacts frozen in time. Preferring a conceptual approach rather than a mournful representation, Hollein otfered a reflection on death as the driving force of life, resonating with the Freudian dialectic of Eros and Thanatos, where destruction and creation mutually respond to and enrich each other.

8 - Work and Behaviour. Life and Death. Everyday Situations Austrian Pavilion, Venice Biennale, 1972

At the 1972 Venice Biennale, Hans Hollein represented Austria with the installation Work and Behaviour. Life and Death. Everyday Situations, an environmental work that explored the rituals of existence, from birth to death.

By stripping everyday items of furniture of their style, he created a visual metaphor for his theories. Outside, a platform on stilts held a stretcher on which laid a shrouded figure, ready for burial. In the “everyday situations” room, furniture covered in white ceramic tile created a cold, clinical atmosphere. A gap invited visitors into the ”sanctuary of nature“, a sacred grove where a hut made of branches evoked the origins of architecture. Here, Hollein contrasted cold functionalism with an architecture that responds to the fundamental and spiritual needs of humans, creating a ceremonial journey that unites the sacred and the profane.

9 - Shop and agencies

Hans Hollein put his experimental ambitions into practice with his first architectural projects. The Retti candle shop (1964-1965) is a manifesto, with its façade in polished aluminium, a material that was unprecedented at the time, giving way to a pop, theatrical interior. This first success was followed by the Christa Metek clothing shop (1966-1967), where he used the brand’s logo to design the front, transforming architecture into an advertising motif. For his first international project, the Richard L. Feigen Gallery (1967-1969) in New York, Hollein played with geometric purity, subverting it with strictly decorative chrome tubes. In Vienna, his jewellery boutiques (1974-1982) juxtapose modernism and Viennese heritage, with nods to the work of Adolf Loos and Josef Hotfmann. Instead of functionalist rigour, Hollein prefers a polysemous and eclectic architecture, as in his interiors for the Austrian travel and transport agency (1976-1978), where classical references are placed alongside pop symbols.

10 - The Gymnastics Lesson, 1984

In 1984, Hans Hollein was invited to create the installation Die Turnstunde [The Gymnastics Lesson] at the Abteiberg Museum in Mönchengladbach, of which he was the architect.

The work explores the body and sensuality in their cultural and cultic dimensions. By staging a gymnastics training session, Hollein otfers a polyphonic interpretation, in which the sculptures of gymnasts and sports equipment carry multiple meanings. The poses of the models echo both 1980s aerobics classes and Vitruvian theories of ideal proportions. The deliberately oversized apparatus are reminiscent of major works of art, while their gilding creates tension with the cold light of the fluorescent tubes. The gold, a symbol of religious icons, lends a sacred halo to the objects, illustrating the way in which formal archetypes shape our perception of reality.

11 - La Strada Novissima, Venice Biennale of Architecture, 1980

Organised by Paolo Portoghesi, the first architecture exhibition “The Presence of the Past” at the 1980 Venice Biennale was a formalisation of postmodernism. The main installation, the Strada Novissima, transformed the Arsenale Corderie into a 70-metre street, where some 20 architects designed monumental façades.

Hollein introduced four new columns, in dialogue with the existing structure. The first was a tree trunk, suggesting the natural origin of this element, a reference to one of the pillars of the Basilica of Sant’Ambrogio in Milan. The second was based on Adolf Loos’ design for the Chicago Herald Tribune. The broken, suspended column served as a functional entrance, while the vertical hedge questioned the duality between nature and culture. Behind the façade, Hollein exhibited his work, otfering a historicising journey in which the continually reinvented column encouraged the visitors to reflect on the permanence and transformation of forms.

12 - Design

For Hans Hollein, object design goes beyond simple utilitarian function and becomes an extension of architecture. Influenced by the pop aesthetic, his creations are characterised by the use of metallic materials, primary colours and stripped-back forms.

His interior design projects, such as the refurbishment of Perchtoldsdorf town hall (1975-1976), introduce furniture that plays an active part in organising the space. In the 1980s, his collaboration with Italian designer Ettore Sottsass led him to join the Memphis Group, through which he created the Schwarzenberg table (1981) and sofas for Poltronova, such as the Mitzi and the Marilyn. He also designed a jewellery collection for Cleto Munari, integrating his architectural style into more personal objects. His Vanity dressing table (1981-1982) fully embodies his approach, blending pop culture, symbolism, excess and irony in furniture design.

13 - Architecture, projects and creations

Hans Hollein saw architecture as an interaction between the symbolic and the functional. Drawing on his experience of creating art installations, he developed a spatial language based on sculptural forms and metaphors. With the Städtisches Abteiberg Museum (1972-1982), he inaugurated a new building typology for contemporary art museums, interacting with the urban context and breaking with linear configurations. The unfinished Museum im Mönchsberg project (1989-1990) took his thinking on integrating earthly elements a step further, culminating in the Vulcania amusement park (1994-2002) in Auvergne, where architecture becomes a metaphorical volcano. His projects, such as the housing complex in Berlin (1983-1985) and the Frankfurt museum (1982-1991), combine volumes, colours and materials to generate visual polysemy. The Haas Haus (1985-1990), in Vienna, illustrates the culmination of his approach, drawing on references to the city’s architectural history.


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