Steirischer herbst draws more than 50,000 visitors

The 59th steirischer herbst festival has already drawn more than 50,000 visitors, its director Ekaterina Degot said on Friday, two days before the event officially ends. ORF reported that Degot gave a positive preliminary assessment at a news conference.

About 3,000 people attended the festival’s accompanying programme, which included more than 400 events at 45 locations. Many events were free, including the open-air opening at Karmeliterplatz. Degot said she was especially pleased that two of the festival’s “Deathmatch” debates were oversubscribed. One featured Florian Klenk, editor-in-chief of the magazine Falter, and philosopher Konrad Paul Liessmann.

The main exhibition will remain open until 15 November because of high demand and limited visitor capacity. Degot said some visitors had noted its small size, which she attributed to the dimensions of the exhibition building, a former inn dating largely from the Baroque period. The accompanying programme will also continue until mid-November.

Festival organisers also welcomed the international media coverage, with reports appearing in newspapers, periodicals, and on radio and television in countries including Germany, Slovenia, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom, Sweden and the United States.

A two-day symposium will take place during the exhibition’s final weekend at the Neue Galerie. Its title is “The End of Contemporary Art: How Did Radical Culture Become So Conservative?” and the keynote address will be given by British philosopher Peter Osborne.

At the news conference, Degot repeated her criticism of regional cultural policy, saying that what she called the “normalisation of conservatism” showed a tendency to provincialise Styria. Next year’s 60th edition, which will be Degot’s last as director, is scheduled to run from 23 September to 17 October.