Marina Abramović

Since the beginning of her career in Belgrade during the early 1970s, Marina Abramović has pioneered performance as a visual art form. She created some of the most important early works in this practice, including Rhythm 0 (1974), in which she offered herself as an object of experimentation for the audience, as well as Rhythm 5 (1974), where she lay in the centre of a burning five-point star to the point of losing consciousness. These performances married concept with physicality, endurance with empathy, complicity with loss of control, passivity with danger. They pushed the boundaries of self-discovery, both of herself and her audience. They also marked her first engagements with time, stillness, energy, pain, and the resulting heightened consciousness generated by long durational performance.

The body has always been both her subject and medium. Exploring her physical and mental limits in works that ritualise the simple actions of everyday life, she has withstood pain, exhaustion and danger in her quest for emotional and spiritual transformation. From 1975-88, Abramović and the German artist Ulay performed together, dealing with relations of duality. She returned to solo performances in 1989 and for The Artist Is Present (2010) she sat motionless for at least eight hours per day over three months, engaged in silent eye-contact with hundreds of strangers one by one.

Abramović was one of the first performance artists to become formally accepted by the institutional museum world with major solo shows taking place throughout Europe and the US over a period of more than 25 years. Her first European retrospective ‘The Cleaner’ was presented at Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Sweden in 2017, followed by presentations at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Copenhagen, Denmark, Henie Onstad, Sanvika, Norway (2017), Bundeskunsthalle, Bonn, Germany (2018), Centre of Contemporary Art, Torun (2019), and Museum of Contemporary Art Belgrade, Serbia (2019). The artist's opera '7 Deaths of Maria Callas' was debuted at the Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich, Germany in 2020, with further performances scheduled at Palais Garnier, Paris, France and the Greek National Opera, Athens, Greece in 2021. In 2023, Abramović will be the first female artist to host a major solo exhibition in the Main Galleries of the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Select solo exhibitions include ‘Akış / Flux’, Sakıp Sabancı Museum, Istanbul, Turkey (2020); ‘As One’, NEON + MAI, Benaki Museum, Athens, Greece (2017); ‘The Space In Between Marina Abramović and Brazil’, SXSW, Austin, Texas, USA (2016); ‘Terra Comunal – Marina Abramović + MAI’, SESC, Pompeia, São Paulo, Brazil (2015); ‘512 Hours’, Serpentine Gallery, London, UK (2014); ‘Holding Emptiness’, Contemporary Art Center, Malaga, Spain (2014); ‘‘The Life and Death of Marina Abramović’ (with Robert Wilson), Park Avenue Armory, New York, NY, USA (2013); ‘Balkan Stories’, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, Austria (2012); ‘The Abramović Method’, Padiglione d'Arte Contemporanea, Milan, Italy (2012); ‘The Artist Is Present’, Garage Center for Contemporary Culture, Moscow, Russia (2011); ‘The Artist is Present’, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, USA (2010); and ‘Seven Easy Pieces’ at the Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, USA (2005). Abramović has participated in many large-scale international exhibitions including the Venice Biennale (1976, 1997) and Documenta VI, VII and IX, Kassel, Germany (1977, 1982 and 1992). She has also established the MAI (Marina Abramović Institute) to support the future exploration and promotion of performance art.

Marina Abramović
Looking at the Mountains
2010
Colour pigment print 160 x 200 cm 63 x 78 3/4 in

Marina Abramović
The Force
2019
Alabaster, LED lighting component inside 49.5 x 53.5 x 7.8 cm 19 3/8 x 21 x 3 in

Marina Abramović
Dozing Consciousness (Body)
2016
Dye sublimation print on aluminium 229.1 x 115.3 cm 90 1/4 x 45 3/8 in

Marina Abramović
In The Sea of Silence
2013
Fine art pigment print 160 x 213 cm 63 x 83 7/8 in

Marina Abramović
The Artist is Present
2010
Performance
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
3 months
image courtesy Marina Abramovic and Sean Kelly Gallery, NY

Marina Abramović
Portrait with Firewood
2010
Black & white photographic print 136 x 136 cm 53 1/2 x 53 1/2 in

Marina Abramović
The Kitchen VI From the Series: The Kitchen, Homage to Saint Therese
2009
Black & White Pigment print on cotton paper 136 x 126 cm 53 1/2 x 49 7/8 in

Marina Abramović
The Kitchen IV
2009
From the Series: The Kitchen, Homage to Saint Therese Colour Chromogenic Print 136 x 126 cm 53 1/2 x 49 7/8 in

Marina Abramović
Still life with Onions
2009
Colour photographic print 104 x 104 cm 41 x 41 in

Marina Abramović
Still life with Potatoes
2008
Color photographic print 104 x 104 x 6.2 cm 40 x 40 x 2 1/2 in

Marina Abramović
Portrait with Potatoes
2008
Colour Chromogenic print 120 x 120 cm 47 1/4 x 47 1/4 in

Marina Abramović
Portrait with Onions
2008
Colour Chromogenic print 120 x 120 cm 47 1/4 x 47 1/4 in

Marina Abramović
Me and Me
2008
Sliver gelatin print 101.6 x 101.6 cm 40 x 40 in + 17.8 cm / 7 in white border

Marina Abramović
7 Easy Pieces: Entering the Other Side
2005
C-Print 226.1 x 153 cm 89 x 60 1/4 in

Marina Abramović
Balkan Baroque I
1997
C-Print 124 x 216 cm 48 7/8 x 85 in

Marina Abramović
White Dragon
1989
Oxidized Copper, Obsidiana 250 x 52.3 x 46 cm 98 3/8 x 20 5/8 x 18 in

Marina Abramović
Art must be beautiful/Artist must be beautiful
1975
Black and white video with sound 23 minutes 36 seconds

Marina Abramović
Rhythm 0
1974

Table with 72 objects and slide projector with slides of performance

Marina Abramović
Rhythm 0
1974

Table with 72 objects and slide projector with slides of performance

Marina Abramović
Rhythm 4
1974
2 Photographic prints and text 166 x 250 x 165.5 cm 65 3/8 x 98 3/8 x 65 1/4 in

Marina Abramović
Rhythm 10
1973
21 Silver gelatin prints and text 122.5 x 898 cm 48 1/4 x 353 1/2 in

Marina Abramović
Dozing Consciousness (Body) - eyes open, 2019

Dye sublimation print aluminum Image size: 229.1 x 115.3 cm Image size: 90 1/8 x 45 3/8 in

Marina Abramović

Exhibitions