Daniel Richter Interview: On Vienna vs. Berlin

“As ‘a working tourist’ in Vienna you see all these smells of the past and not all of them are disgusting.” Hear why German painter Daniel Richter prefers Vienna – where he works as professor at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste Wien – over Berlin.

Richter, who is based in Berlin, has been a professor at the art academy in Vienna since 2006, a “working tourist” of the Austrian capital. A crown jewel of the Austria-Hungarian empire, Vienna is a reminder of “the decadence of the monarchy, the derangement of mankind on a very high luxurious level,” says Richter. But Vienna is not only home to glorious buildings and decadent pasts, it is also the city of the avant-gardes, of Klimt and Kokoschka, Einstein and Freud. In Richter’s opinion “the grand history of culture is embedded in the people of Vienna, more so than the Weimar past is a part of the Berliners.”

Daniel Richter (b. 1962) is a German painter whose strongly coloured, often slightly surreal paintings convey current events and art historical issues with an irreverent and energetic approach. A professor at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Vienna, Austria, his work is widely exhibited, among others at Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Belgium, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Germany and Victoria Miro Gallery in London, UK. Richter’s paintings can be found in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Centre Pompidou, Paris and elsewhere.

Daniel Richter was interviewed by Marc-Christoph Wagner in his studio in Berlin, Germany, and at Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark, in July 2016, in connection with the exhibition ‘Lonely Old Slogans’.

Camera: Klaus Elmer & Rasmus Quistgaard
Produced by Marc-Christoph Wagner
Edited by: Klaus Elmer
Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2016

Supported by Nordea-fonden

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[TheStockwell]

Berlin vs. Vienna is like New York vs. San Francisco or cities with skyscrapers vs. small towns with meadows. You usually enjoy one and hate the other or feel better once you leave one and go to the other.

[DREDQ]

does anybody know what glasses he's wearing?

[httm]

Berlin is basically the San Jose of Europe

[ojaswitluthra]

vienna is a living breathing city, informed by it's history but still so diverse and there's a lot of traditional older people and things but they're also always being challenged. being cheaper has more recently made it full of interesting younger people too. artists can afford to live here in the city and even possibly rent a studio while working part time. means there's a lot more creative people coming in and there's a big art scene cultivated by the people who've been here for a long time. Berlin is really cool but a lot of that coolness has been capitalised on by conventional systems. now some of that coolness feels manufactured. vienna is all the old traditional things and also authentically creative and artistic. it's calm and rushed, exciting and boring, old and new. and very underrated. it's one of the youngest cities in Europe by average age but people associate it with older people and tradition. it's one of the more progressive major cities in Europe but people associate it with conservatives. i think the city has a bit of a weird image problem but they're happy to leave it be because this image is better for bringing in richer tourists as opposed to younger poorer tourists lol.

[pleasenohate]

I love that s from emenskirchen which is more of a rural area

[fjellyo]

Wien ist Dekadenz aber ich mag Wien auch. Nicht mehr als Berlin aber es ist eine schöne Stadt!

[m.r.]

he describes the vienna of the past. stuff which happened over 100 years ago. fact is there isnt much happening in vienna right now, as opposed to berlin

[LeoEhrlich]

You're so lucky to be born in a first world country

ach der Richter labert einfach zu viel, so wie Ai WeiWei

[AbsoluteZero]

You don’t love Berlin? Some other Austrian kid will.

[paulrxxxmann]

wien, i like it because Im lazy ... this is not a good sign, stars (?) in Wien today : A rainer, hridlcka, ... having trouble finding anyone else me ! where is the new young talent of substance ?