the evening and the morning and the night
Birke Gorm
Austrian Pavilion at the 16th Gwangju Biennale, South Korea, 2026
5 September – 15 November 2026
Artist Birke Gorm represents Austria at the 16th Gwangju Biennale in 2026. Under the title the evening and the morning and the night, she transforms the upper floor of Gwangju’s Eunam Museum of Art both physically and conceptually into an attic—a storage place, full of latent energies, largely left undisturbed. The exhibition is curated by Attilia Fattori Franchini and marks the second national presentation by Austria at the Gwangju Biennale. In her artistic practice, Birke Gorm investigates the life cycle of everyday objects. Through collecting, reusing, and reinterpreting materials, she examines how objects carry, lose, or reshape meaning. In doing so, she interrogates the ideological frameworks around the narration of history and evolving attitudes toward social representation, gender, industrialisation, and value. The works in the Austrian Pavilion reveal hidden narratives while also pointing to processes of survival, upheaval, and reclaiming.
The attic functions as a central motif. As a place where old, forgotten, or hidden objects are stored, where things appear static, fixed, or asleep, yet reveal a life of their own when unobserved. Regarded as the mind of the house, it mirrors its residents’ emotional states, symbolizing the mind’s storage and rediscovery of repressed memories, unprocessed emotions, and the societal forces that linger beneath the surface and shape identity. In this realm of the hidden, the often-overlooked stories—especially those of women, who are frequently marginalized—are brought to the foreground as sources of resistance and resilience.
At the center of the exhibition in the Austrian Pavilion is a series of new figurative sculptures that expand the artist’s existing body of work. These ambiguous bodies—exhausted, determined, lazy, stubborn, relaxed, protective, defensive, on a break, or on strike—are primarily composed of discarded and repurposed materials collected in Vienna and on-site in Gwangju. They are placed, piled, or arranged together, coexisting by coincidence, will, or force to form a complex topography that invites viewers to observe, linger, and discover.
An ever-changing lighting choreography and a subtle soundscape composed of synthetic and everyday sounds shift the space between day and night, creating a mise-en-scène that probes the threshold between labor and rest, productivity and leisure. Within this dynamic, the attic no longer appears as a static storage space, but as a living, continuously transforming environment.
A series of workshops in collaboration with local practitioners will unfold throughout the exhibition and investigate the use of language in relation to the act of gathering and collecting. The Austrian Pavilion is commissioned by Phileas - The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art and co-financed by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport. Additional support is provided by the Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs. Alongside the Austrian Pavilion, the Eunam Museum of Art will also host the Swiss Pavilion, commissioned by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia, which will present an exhibition by Denise Bertschi curated by Claire Hoffmann and Tadeo Kohan.
For press inquiries and further information please contact: press@austrianpaviliongwangju.com
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The Austrian Pavilion is commissioned by Phileas - The Austrian Office for Contemporary Art and co-financed by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Housing, Arts, Culture, Media, and Sport. Additional support is provided by the Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs. Alongside the Austrian Pavilion, the Eunam Museum of Art will also host the Swiss Pavilion, commissioned by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia, which will present an exhibition by Denise Bertschi curated by Claire Hoffmann and Tadeo Kohan.
For further information about the Austrian Pavilion in Gwangju please click here.
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Birke Gorm (b. 1986, Hamburg, Germany) is a visual artist based in Vienna. Her approach to working with materials reflects the information that they carry and their immediate impact on society, some of which remains visible until today. She sets the autonomy of these materials in relation to traditional production techniques and the gender roles assigned to them, which in turn shape issues such as labour, self-optimisation, and societal processes of equality. She holds a master’s degree from the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, and a bachelor’s degree in Fashion and Textile Design from the Design School Kolding, Denmark.
In recent years, her work has been presented in solo exhibitions at O–Overgaden, Copenhagen; MQ Art Box, MuseumsQuartier Wien, Vienna; Croy Nielsen, Vienna; MAK – Museum of Applied Arts, Vienna; Museum Sønderjylland, Tønder; Politikens Forhal, Copenhagen; Vestjyllands Kunstpavillon, Videbæk; and in group exhibitions at Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler, Berlin; P21, Seoul; Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna; Martina Simeti, Milan; mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna; the National Gallery of Denmark, Copenhagen; and Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt. The artist is represented by Croy Nielsen, Vienna.
Her works are held in the collections of Kunsthaus Bregenz; Dom Museum, Vienna; Kunstmuseum Brandts, Odense; Lentos Kunstmuseum Linz; MAK – Museum of Applied Arts, Vienna; mumok – Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna; Museum der Moderne Salzburg; Museum Sønderjylland, Tønder; and the National Gallery of Denmark, Copenhagen.
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Attilia Fattori Franchini (b. 1983, Pesaro, Italy) is an independent curator and writer based in Vienna. In her work, she creates experimental spaces for the production and presentation of contemporary art and addresses topics such as technology, post-capitalism, language, and femininity. She is a guest professor of Curatorial Practice at the University of Arts Linz (2025−26); director of the ‘curated by’ festival in Vienna; founder and director of KUNSTVEREIN GARTENHAUS, Vienna; and founder and editor of the publishing house Wild Seeds.
Fattori Franchini conceived and established the initiative BMW Open Work by Frieze (2017−23), realizing solo presentations by Sara Sadik, Nikita Gale, Madeline Hollander, Camille Blatrix, Sam Lewitt, and Olivia Erlanger. Since 2018, she has been the curator of the Emergent section of the Milan art fair miart. She has recently curated the exhibition Rebecca Ackroyd: Mirror Stage, a collateral event of the 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia (2024), and has worked as a researcher at the Institute for Art Theory and Cultural Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna (2021–24) and at the Università degli Studi di Urbino Carlo Bo, Urbino, Italy (2022–24).
Her writing has appeared in publications such as Mousse, Artforum, CURA., Flash Art International, Camera Austria and Spike as well as authoring catalog essays for monographs on the work of Birke Gorm, Jakob Lena Knebl & Ashley Hans Scheirl, Hervé Guibert, Diego Marcon, Tatjana Dannenberg, Rosa Rendl, Andreia Santana, Anaïs Horn, and Superflex.
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The publication tales from the attic accompanies the Austrian Pavilion at the 16th Gwangju Biennale and includes new contributions by Attilia Fattori Franchini, Laura McLean-Ferris, Birke Gorm, Estelle Hoy, and Robert Müller, among others. Imagined as an object to be found in the attic, the publication will invite visitors at the Pavilion to experience a solitary moment between criticality and imagination.
The publication is designed by FONDAZIONE, Vienna, and published by DISTANZ, Berlin.
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The Gwangju Biennale in South Korea was founded in 1995 and is considered the oldest and most renowned biennial for contemporary art in Asia. Since 2018, the biennial has hosted national pavilions and satellite exhibitions by international art institutions at cultural venues across the city alongside the main exhibition. Each edition brings together artists, curators, and audiences from around the world to explore new ideas, foster dialogue, and engage with urgent social, political, and cultural issues and the changing conditions and crises of our time—from climate change and unpredictable pandemics to democratic backsliding.
Titled You Must Change Your Life, the 16th Gwangju Biennale takes place between September 5 and November 15, 2026 and is curated by Ho Tzu Nyen. Under his artistic direction, the 2026 edition aims to examine the transformative power of artistic practices amid the turbulence of contemporary times and to overcome the sense of individual powerlessness that often accompanies them.
The Austrian Pavilion participates as a major presentation within the ‘16th Gwangju Biennale Pavilions’ hosted by Gwangju Metropolitan City and the Gwangju Biennale Foundation. The ‘16th Gwangju Biennale Pavilions’ serve as an international platform of solidarity where approximately 30 countries, cities, and institutions showcase their curatorial and artistic autonomy.
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Birke Gorm
the evening and the morning and the nightAustrian Pavilion
16th Gwangju Biennale 2026, South Korea
September 5 – November 15, 2026Austrian Pavilion Opening
Saturday, September 5, 2026Venue
Eunam Museum of Art
8-12 Seoseok-ro 85beon-gil
Dong-gu, Gwangju, South Korea -
Austrian Pavilion at the 16th Gwangju Biennale
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