The 18 Most Appalling International Art World Scandals of 2015

It seems as if there’s never a quiet moment in the art world, especially during boom times. There are record-breaking auctions,controversial exhibitions, and even violent episodes by artists, as well as trolling by the general public. Here’s a quick guide to some of the more scandalous news reports that have happened over the course of this year.

Think Halloween Is Gruesome? Try Contemporary Art

In the spirit of Halloween, ARTINFO has compiled a list of nine gruesome contemporary art works that give us nightmares all year long. From David Lynch’s “Six Men Getting Sick” to Hermann Nitsch’s “Theater of Orgies and Mysteries,” we’ve covered all the bases as October 31 approaches. Read on for our full, illustrated list. By way of example, Piero […]

Intensity is the Best Politics: Hermann Nitsch in New York

From his earliest performances and actions in the 1960s involving animal remains through his infamous multi-day, multimedia festivals staged at an Austrian castle, Hermann Nitsch has remained a figure of boldness and controversy. Earlier this year a major show at Museo Jumex in Mexico City wascancelled — but no such fate has befallen the artist’s […]

Blood and Soil: Vienna Actionism’s Dangerous Game

Its Wikipedia entry calls it “a short and violent movement,” and even compared with the aesthetic extremes of the 1960s, the unrelenting art of Vienna Actionism stands apart. After the passage of fifty years, the questions it raised about the limits and origins of art remain no less troubling or closer to resolution. The four […]

First major Actionist show comes to Britain

Violent and sexual precursor to performance art is dramatically laid bare in new exhibition. Brus and his fellow Actionists, Otto Muhl, Hermann Nitsch and Rudolf Schwarzkogler, have been explained away as the upshot of Austria’s failure to come to terms with Nazism, as an extreme manifestation of the sexual revolution, a logical extension of action […]