Interviews

Nitsch’s personal assistant

Mr. Stasta is Nitsch’s personal assistant. His main work is to assist Mr. Nitsch when he is painting. He has to mix the colours or to prepare the canvas. Furthermore he organizes the shows.
Mr. Stasta is also a painter and he likes to listen to music while he is painting. He is also a photographer and pours colours on canvas like Nitsch.
Dramatics have inspired him and so he has found Nitsch one day. He first met him in the academy of arts in Styria. Nitsch hired Mr. Stasta there because his old assistant signed off.
His opinions of Nitsch are very positive; he likes his paintings and his music. He said that there was more behind his art. He explained that Nitsch wanted to demonstrate the beautiful and bad aspects of life. Moreover it is not the picture which is important it is the process of painting.
He does not know how long he wants to stay his assistant, because he is an artist too. However, he likes to work with Nitsch and he is learning a lot. It is great fun to work with Nitsch and he can widen his horizon considerable.
He likes to act in Nitsch’s promotions. Nitsch invited him to come to his promotion in the summer. He told his family and his friends and their reactions where different. Some of them thought he had gone crazy, but his mother did not care about it, she said that he could do whatever he liked to.
Rehearsing for the promotion lasted ten days. They did it without blood. Nitsch said what they had to do and the actors had to keep up with the script.
The other actors were very nice and respectable. He had to trust the other actors, because during the promotion they blindfolded him. They poured blood into his mouth.
His first impression was amazing. He had amplified his sensory perception. The extremes of beauty and badness were dissolving.
Now he cannot say that something is bad or beautiful. He says that life is a mix of beauty and badness. He says that life includes brutality and killing, it cannot exist without them.
It was hard for the musicians to play Nitsch’s music, but they did their job very well.
Between the promotions there were some breaks, but after it Mr. Stasta was overwrought and they had a big party.
He was asked if he could describe a normal working day with Nitsch, but he answered with a big smile that there had never been a normal working day. He has to face more and more challenges with every day. He also said that Nitsch concentrated a lot while he was painting, but it is always worth the trouble. It takes Nitsch three to four hours to finish one painting, but he paints alone. Mr. Stasta only makes sure the big buckets for the huge paintings have been tightly fixed.

Mrs. Magdalena Frey – photographer

She doesn’t know Nitsch personally, but her husband has known him for a long time because they went to school together. Furthermore she has taken part at many activities.
So she took pictures of his paintings.

She thinks that his work is very important, because it has a hidden message you have to be aware of and so it is an important experience in everybody’s life.

Mr. Karl Bergauer – Musician

Nitsch’s musical acts need to be seen as a complete piece of work. If you listen to them you have to forget your usual listening habits. He said you have to listen to the music and to see the pictures at the same moment.

The musical acts are not really difficult to play, but they are very different to other music.
It’s more important to get the right volume and the length than the right tone. The instruments’ insets are different.
There is one main topic what is repeated again and again. Otherwise coincidence plays an important role.

Often musicians have problems playing the original music, so Mr. Bergauer has to re-write it on normal music sheets.

During the opening of the museum there were lots of different reactions by visitors, but most of them accepted Hermann Nitsch as an international artist.

Last but not least Mr. Bergauer said that it is a change to his normal work.

Mr. Erich Waltner – Teacher

At first he did not really like Nitsch, but then he read one of his scripts and he changed his opinions about Nitsch. He was fascinated and he said that he liked the meticulous way of working.
He was also fascinated by the strictness in Nitsch’s art. Mr. Waltner also mentioned the elements which are not part of our society.
He thought that it is strange that butchering animals is evil, but eating them is right.
Mr. Waltner also compared Nitsch with Yves Klein, a famous action painter.
We asked him about the Nitsch Museum in Mistelbach and he said that he has not yet been there.
He would never attend an action by Nitsch, but he would like to be a spectator.

Mrs. Isolde Klughofer– Employee in the Nitsch Museum in Mistelbach

Mrs. Klughofer has been working in the Nitsch Museum since the opening of the museum.
She is really happy with her work, and she likes to work there.
First she did not like the smell of the plastics and the monotonous music, but later she got used to the smell and the noises.
She thought that the pictures and the music harmonize, and they have a certain charm.
She would like to attend an action by Nitsch.