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Starting on October 10, 2025, Vienna will host the first major retrospective of Marina Abramović (1946, Belgrade) in Austria, presented at Albertina Modern in collaboration with Bank Austria Kunstforum Wien. Spanning more than five decades, the show traces her artistic journey from early works created in 1970s Belgrade, through her legendary collaboration with Ulay, to her later solo performances involving direct audience participation.

A central feature of the exhibition will be the daily live reenactments of her historical performances, offering visitors a rare chance to witness performance art in its most authentic and immediate form. From the very beginning, Marina Abramović has explored the physical and psychological boundaries of the human body, confronting themes of endurance, pain, time, silence, vulnerability, and transformation. For her, the body has always been both the subject and the medium of her art.

The exhibition includes key works such as the early Rhythm series, which tested the limits of control and passivity, her intense collaborations with Ulay from 1976 to 1988, and her later iconic solo works such as The Artist Is Present, performed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2010. During that piece, Abramović sat silently across from museum visitors for eight hours a day over three months, creating one of the most impactful and widely recognized performances of the 21st century.

Also on view will be the award-winning Balkan Baroque, for which she received the Golden Lion at the 1997 Venice Biennale, as well as the participatory Transitory Objects for Human Use and more recent installations, such as Four Crosses (2019).

The exhibition has been designed in close collaboration with the artist. It is organized thematically, with dedicated rooms exploring core concepts in her work, including the limits of the body, spirituality, communism, energy from nature, and audience participation.

This major retrospective is the result of an international partnership between the Royal Academy of Arts in London, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, Kunsthaus Zürich, Bank Austria Kunstforum Wien, and the Albertina Museum in Vienna. It offers not only an unparalleled opportunity to experience the full range of Abramović’s influential oeuvre, but also a unique encounter with performance art as a living, transformative experience created in the space between artist and audience.

Tickets and further information are available on the official websites of Albertina Modern and Bank Austria Kunstforum Wien. Marina Abramović’s retrospective in Vienna promises to be one of the most significant cultural events of 2025.

The exhibition runs until March 1, 2026.