Exhibition "Garden of Eden", Neuhaus Castle // 17 July - 4 August 2019

A Garden of Eden is a place of longing - a place where people live in harmony with nature, cautiously using existing resources and living peacefully. It is a utopia, a garden full of lush plants, sweet fruits and exotic animals that provide food in abundance. Such a paradise nourishes our elemental desire for harmonious coexistence in the community while at the same time embodying the principle of exclusion. The notion contains a longing for something that is ever valid as well as the experience of transience and fragility of life.
The idea of the garden in Eden is thousands of years old and finds expression in various forms of human culture in ever new variants. Even textiles were and are still important carriers of this complex topic. As an inspiration, the motto of the Garden of Eden offered material for an exhibition of a special kind:

As part of the summer symposium TEXTILE KULTUR HASLACH and the parallel ETN (European Textile Network) conference, an international group exhibition was organised on this theme, showing works by contemporary textile artists. A total of 452 submissions were received, from which a panel of experts selected the best works.

The selected works were very different in terms of the techniques and materials used and dealt with the "Garden of Eden" in very different ways, resulting in a diverse view of the subject. In addition to the juried works, some well-known artists were personally invited to participate in the exhibition. The exhibition opened up a broad overview of current trends in the field of contemporary textile art and presented a total of 90 works by artists from 34 nations.

 

The following artists were selected by the jury or were invited to participate:
(names in alphabetical order)

  • Ingrid Aarset, Norway
  • Keiko Amenomori-Schmeisser, Japan
  • Eunsun An, South Korea
  • Gudrun Bartenberger-Geyer, Austria
  • Pia Best-Reininghaus, Germany
  • Eszter Bornemisza, Hungary
  • Kerstin Brandl, Sarah Rachinger, Alexandra Pisslinger, Austria
  • Miroslav Broos, Slovakia
  • Leo Chiachio + Daniel Giannone, Argentina
  • Agata Ciechomska, Poland
  • Fiona Crestani, New Zealand
  • Wlodzimierz Cygan, Poland
  • Kristina Daukintyte Aas, Norway
  • Ysabel De Maisonneuve, France
  • Katarzyna Dietrych-Kuzak, Poland
  • Aino Favén, Finland
  • Silvia Fedorová, Slovakia
  • Cecile Feilchenfeldt, Switzerland
  • Judith P. Fischer, Austria
  • Doris Gall-Schuhmann, Austria
  • Samani Gasimova, Azerbaijan
  • Michel Gautier, Canada
  • Marianne Gogg, Austria
  • Anna Goldgruber, Austria
  • Marie-Hélène Guelton, France
  • Constanze Habringer Krög, Austria
  • Susanne Heindl, Austria
  • Ane Henriksen, Denmark
  • Daniel Henry, Belgium
  • Elaine Andrea Herrmann, Germany
  • Ellis Hinz-Berg, Denmark
  • Cordula Hofmann-Molis, Germany
  • Maria Hromadová, Slovakia
  • Zuzana Hromadová, Slovakia
  • Severija Incirauskaite-Kriauneviciene, Lithuania
  • Alexander Jakimenko, Germany/Ukraine
  • Barbara Jansen, Sweden/Germany
  • Raija Jokinen, Finland
  • Beatrix Kaser, Austria
  • Sari Kettunen, Finland
  • Magdalena Kleszynska, Poland
  • Naomi Kobayashi, Japan
  • Lis Korsgren, Sweden
  • Eva Koziol, Germany
  • Julie Bénédicte Lambert, Canada
  • Nathalie Irene Kröll, Austria
  • Rolands Krutovs, Latvia
  • Mary Lee Murphy, Ireland
  • Margit Leeb, Austria
  • Louise Lemieux Bérubé, Canada
  • Christiane Löhr, Germany
  • Marina Mamyan, Armenia
  • Sonja Meller, Austria
  • Gabi Mett, Germany
  • Edith Meusnier, France
  • Vilyana Milanova, Bulgaria
  • Veronika Moos, Germany
  • Sibylle Nagel, Austria
  • Elin Noble, USA
  • Piotr Pandyra, Poland
  • Tim Parry-Williams, UK
  • Sylvia Paul, UK
  • Marilyn Piirsalu and Kadi Pajupuu, Estonia
  • Johanna Pöykkö, Finland
  • Elke Prieß, Germany
  • Arpad Pulai, Serbia
  • Eva Raiser-Johanson, Germany
  • Monika Rauh, Germany
  • Lisa Reichmann, Germany
  • Tuuli Reinsoo, Estonia
  • Gerda Ritzmann-Luger, Switzerland
  • Susanne Roittner-Nething, Germany
  • Dorothea Rosenstock, Germany
  • Amanda Salm, USA
  • Ismini Samanidou, Greece
  • Christina Sandner, Austria
  • Monika Steiner, Austria
  • Iona Dana Mandragora Steixner, Austria
  • Chioko Tanaka, Japan
  • Jun Tomita, Japan
  • Ingrid Tragler, Austria
  • Elisa Treml, Austria
  • Natalia Tsvetkova, Russia
  • Mariëlle van den Bergh, Netherlands
  • Tarja Wallius, Finland
  • Wissa Wassef Art Center, Egypt
  • Kerstin Wiesmayer, Austria
  • Weilin Yang, Taiwan
  • Paul Yore, Australia
  • Hugo Zumbühl & Peter Birsfelder (teppich-art-team), Switzerland