Then a man walked through Kärntnerstrasse, he was pretty naked, but he was painted white and had black perforations from his belly button down to his leg, a living corpse, an undead, Günter Brus on his “Vienna Walk” in 1965. The action was only completed when popular anger was aroused and the police had to intervene. Without much knowledge of Fluxus or what else was going on in America, the Viennese actionists Otto Muehl, Hermann Nitsch and Rudolf Schwarzkogler discovered body art sixty years ago right in the heart of Habsburg bliss and very quickly achieved world level. The following year, Brus and Nitsch were invited to the “Destruction in Art Symposium” in London, organized by Holocaust survivor Gustav Metzger, the first mentor of guitar smasher Pete Townshend.
On the death of Günter Brus: The Man of Excess – Culture
