At the beginning of September, our association was invited to a salon discussion on this topic organized by host Gertrud Schneider at the Hotel Kristiania in Lech in collaboration with the art magazine Parnass.
Over the past decades, art and culture have become firmly established in the mountains. Many initiatives throughout the Alpine region bear witness to this, such as the signature of Vorarlberg artist Gottfried Bechtold on the dam wall of Lake Silvretta, the project KunstRaumBerg — Silvretta-Bielerhöhe — with works by Roman Signer, Miriam Prantl, Herbert Albrecht, the ArteVent in Tyrol, Arte Sella in Trentino or the Parkin Not dal Mot by artist Not Vital at the entrance to Sent/Engadin, the Skyspace-Lech and the project Horizon Field Vorarlberg in Lech am Arlberg, to name but a few.
What are the intentions and goals of these formats? What do they mean for tourism? What is the effect of encountering art and culture in the mountains? What conditions need to be created for this? Who owns the public space? Where are the limits of artistic interventions in the cultural and natural landscape? These questions and more were the central topics of the panel discussion chaired by Parnass editor-in-chief Sylvie Aigner.
The panel included Otto Huber (HORIZON FIELD — Kunstverein Vorarlberg), Christof Rösch (Fundazion Nairs, Engadin), Thomas Häusle (Kunstraum Dornbirn) and Hermann Fercher (Tourism Director Lech/Zürs).
