Jurgensen, Birgit

Birgit Jurgensen was born in Vienna in 1949. From 1968 to 1971, she studied at the local . Then, from 1980 to 1981, she taught at the same university. From 1982 to 1997, Jurgensen worked as a teacher at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts ^{[4] [5]} . In addition, she acted as a curator of a number of exhibitions ^[6] . Jurgensen died in her hometown in 2003 ^[4] .

Birgit Jurgensen was recognized as one of the “outstanding representatives of the international feminist avant-garde ” ^[7] . Since the late 1960s, she has been developing various forms of photo art - the main theme of her work was the female body and its "transformations" ^[8] . Her self-portraits and photographs covered events related to the daily life of women: and in a variety of forms, including the atmosphere of “shocking fear” and prejudice ^[6] .

In the work of Jurgensen various “forms of femininity” were presented, created or transmitted through photography. Her work reflected the repressive and restrictive nature of social norms regarding women of that time. Among her works there were also drawings and watercolors . Hubert Winter ( German: Hubert Winter ), the manager of the Jurgensen Manor House Museum , where many of Birgit’s works were presented, played a large role in Jurgensen’s work.

In 1972, creating a work on a " gender " theme, Jurgensen photographed herself in four poses, forming four letters in the German word "woman" ( German: Frau ). In another self-portrait, created in 1976 and entitled “I want to get out of here!”, Jurgensen was dressed as a “good wife” - in a dress with a “neat white collar and a lace brooch” - while she portrayed herself with her cheek and hands pressed to a glass display case, which was interpreted by critics as “its capture in the repressive norms of female beauty and home life, which women were often subjected to” ^[9] .

Jurgensen's photographic works, of which there were about 250, were exhibited at a retrospective exhibition held jointly by the Collectors' Union ( German Sammlung Verbund ) and the Bank of Austria Vienna Art Forum ( German Bank Austria Kunstforum ); fifty of them were exhibited only by the Vienna Union ^[8] . One of the unique works of Jurgensen was considered the project “10 days - 100 photos”, published in 1980. This collection, which contained 100 photographs — indeed created over ten days — consisted of self-portraits taken on Polaroid, as well as classic photographs in which the protagonist’s face was “masked” with fur . About this series, Jurgensen herself said that "the woman’s personality is shown to disappear - there is nothing left but a fetishized object, which is the center of male fantasy." In another of her works, created earlier (in 1974) and called “Amazon”, Birgit Jurgensen photographed “mother and child” in erect postures - with hands similar to “figures of saints in a very high chair” ^[10] .

In many of his drawings and photographs, Jurgensen actively used the skin as the basis of the composition , and in these works she often managed to convey the properties of this material ^[11] . In this context, critics emphasized the so-called “shoe series”, performed in the 1970s and consisting of various “shoe sculptures”. In total, Jurgensen created eighteen such “sculptures”, for each of which she used a different material: porcelain , wax , rust , bread and even the jaws of the animal mounted on a silk pillow (Relict Shoe, 1976). One of the drawings depicted three stones in the shape of a female pubis - the work was called "Beauty Contest" (1978) ^[10] .

Other notable paintings by Jurgensen were The Housewife-Apron ( German: Hausfrauen-Küchenschürze , 1975), The Nest ( German: Nest , 1979) and Now ( German: Nun , 1979) - self-portraits in gold color on whose heroine is dressed in a black mask and presented lying “in a theatrical setting” ^[10] . In particular, on the first of them, Jurgensen portrayed herself as a “female form” that merged with a stove and “thus formed a new organism” ^[12] .

Birgit Jurgensen devoted two major monographs. The first, published by Hatje Cantz ( German: Hatje Cantz ) in 2009, contained some photographs of the artist, illustrating her “independent approach” to art ^[13] . The second monograph was published in 2010 under the editorship of and Heike Eipeldauer ( German: Heike Eipeldauer ) ^{[14] [10]} .

Personal exhibitions

• Retrospective , Bank Austria Kunstforum, Vienna (2011)
• Sammlung Verbund, Vienna (2009)
• Subversive Aspects of "Feminism" , Museum of Applied Arts - MAK, Vienna (2004)
• XL: 19 New Acquisitions in Photography , MoMA , New York (2013)
• Privacy , Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt (2013)
• Center Pompidou, Paris (2010)
• MAK and Belvedere Gallery , Vienna ^[10] .

Selected Exhibitions

• XX, Kunsthal Charlottenborg , Copenhagen (1975)
• MAGNA. Feminismus: Kunst und Kreativität , , Vienna (1975)
• LINEATUREN. Graphische Sammlung , Albertina , Vienna, (1978) ^[4]

Books

• Schor G., Solomon-Godeau A. Birgit Jurgensen = Birgit Jürgenssen. - Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2009 .-- 296 p. - ISBN 978-3-7757-2460-9 .
• Schor G., Eipeldauer H. Birgit Jürgenssen. Exhibition catalog. - Munich: Prestel Verlag, 2010 .-- 312 p. - ISBN 978-3-7913-5103-2 .
• Bösch G., Finta D., Hoffer A., ​​et al. Augenblick Foto-Kunst. - Edition Sammlung Essl, 2002 .-- 165 p. - ISBN 978-3902001061 .
• Lajer-Burcharth E., Söntgen B. Interiors and Interiority. - Walter de Gruyter , 2016 .-- 497 p. - ISBN 978-3-11-034045-7 .
• Mörtenböck P., Mooshamme H. Space (Re) Solutions. - Transcript. - 2011 .-- 264 p. - ISBN 978-3-8394-1847-5 .

Articles

• Retrospective: Birgit Jürgenssen // Kunsthalle Krems. - 2009. - September. Archived June 3, 2016.
• Birgit Jürgenssen: Woman, 1972 // The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) . - New York, 2006.
• Birgit Jürgenssen. Works from the 1970 // Wall Street International Magazine. - 2013. - October 16.
• Birgit Jürgenssen // Alison Jacques Gallery. - London, 2013.

• Estate Birgit Jürgenssen Website