Vienna Dream - Wiens bester Spätkauf

Vienna Dream - Wiens bester Spätkauf is a walk-in installation and performance that deals with the re-socialization of urban spaces as spaces of social encounter in Vienna. Anne Zühlke and Eliza Chojnacka set up and ran Vienna's first Spätkauf (late-night store) in an off-space for two weeks to create a place of common interests for the neighbourhood.

What appears to be a direct quotation of a Berlin “Späti” at first sight is a temporary installation and performance. A 24-hours drop-in shop, which is attracting all those who are looking for goods such as cheap beer and snacks during the Viennese nights, becomes a place of neighbourly encounter – a place of social gathering. With their work the two artists address the topics of night economy and subculture in Vienna and other big cities. Moreover, they make informal structures of the night visible: It is no coincidence that late-night shopping and other places of nightly refuge are often linked to migrant communities. They have been exposed to mechanisms of segregation for generations and thus have developed strategies to hold their own economically and socially despite all adversities. In Vienna, public and semi-public spaces are precisely the spaces, on which alternative and non-commercial organizers and initiatives are particularly dependent. Vienna Dream shows the potential of informal and artistic strategies for the urgently needed re-socialization of urban spaces as spaces of social encounter.

Time

January 2020

Location

Vienna

Team

Eliza Chojnacka and Anne Zühlke