One of Vienna's most prestigious art institutions, the BA Art Forum, will permanently close its doors on Thursday at 6 PM, marking the end of an era for Austria's cultural landscape. The final exhibition, ironically titled 'Human Berlin,' showcases the 40-year anniversary collection of Berlin's Volksbank, making it particularly poignant that a German bank's celebration will be the last event in this iconic Viennese venue.
The closure comes amid ongoing financial difficulties following the collapse of the Signa real estate empire, which previously owned the building. Despite earlier negotiations with the new property owner and attempts to find alternative funding solutions, UniCredit Bank Austria was unable to save what had been the flagship institution representing the unique and fruitful partnership between banking and arts sponsorship in German-speaking countries.
The timing carries an unexpected irony, as Berlin's Volksbank chose this sinking Viennese institution to celebrate their collection's milestone. Their 'Human Berlin' exhibition demonstrates the important social function that corporate art collections can serve. The bank began collecting representational paintings from East Germany four years before the Berlin Wall fell, acquiring works by artists like Wolfgang Mattheuer and Werner Tübke. Later, they expanded the collection to include West German artists such as Markus Lüpertz and the Neue Wilde movement, creating a visual narrative of Germany's division and reunification through 1,500 paintings, sculptures, and graphics.
Carsten Jung, CEO of Berlin's Volksbank, summarized his institution's sponsorship philosophy at the exhibition opening with a telling statement: 'Sports was yesterday, culture is today.' This perspective makes the loss of Vienna's BA Art Forum even more significant, as it represents a retreat from cultural investment at a time when other institutions are embracing it.
Although UniCredit Bank Austria insists that closing the Art Forum won't reduce their cultural sponsorship budget but merely redirect it, the shutdown of such an internationally renowned institution sends a powerful negative signal about Vienna as a cultural destination. The closure reflects a growing disinterest from Austria's struggling economy in maintaining and supporting cultural institutions that have long defined the city's artistic identity.
The BA Art Forum's origins trace back to an unlikely suggestion from popular Austrian entertainer Heinz Conrads, famous for his television greeting 'Good evening, girls, hello, boys.' In 1980, Conrads proposed holding exhibitions in the cashier hall of the Austrian Creditanstalt on Freyung. The concept proved surprisingly successful, leading then-bank director and future Chancellor Franz Vranitzky to establish a permanent exhibition space.
Architect Gustav Peichl was commissioned to renovate the space, adding the characteristic golden sphere above the entrance that became the forum's signature feature. The venue officially opened in 1989 with an Egon Schiele exhibition, essentially serving as the coming-out party for Rudolf Leopold's collection. The first director was Klaus Albrecht Schröder, an ambitious young art historian from Linz who revolutionized Vienna's exhibition culture by introducing popular special exhibitions with market-tested titles and sophisticated marketing strategies.
Under Schröder's successor, Ingried Brugger, the forum gained international recognition for its focus on female artists, well before this became a global trend. Beginning with a magnificent Tamara de Lempicka exhibition in 2004, the venue showcased major retrospectives of Frida Kahlo, Meret Oppenheim, Georgia O'Keeffe, Kiki Kogelnik, and Rebecca Horn. A planned exhibition of Serbian performance art pioneer Marina Abramović, originally scheduled for fall, will now take place as a guest exhibition at the Albertina Modern.
While the BA Art Forum itself will disappear, Gustav Peichl's golden sphere will remain above the entrance at Freyung 8. Regardless of what commercial ventures may eventually occupy the space below, this architectural element will stand as a monument to the extraordinary cultural institution that once thrived there, serving as a reminder of what Vienna has lost in its ongoing struggle to balance economic pressures with cultural preservation.
