Stadtwerkstatt Linz - STWST

AUTONOMOUS STRUCTURE SINCE 1979

Stadtwerkstatt (STWST) is a cultural center in Linz, Austria, which was founded as an artists' collective in 1979. Since the 1980s it has shaped media history with significant projects in the context of new media. Today Stadtwerkstatt still houses three initiatives from this period of time. They have important roles in the making of artistic and citizen-generated content. Over the past years each initiative has developed its own hands-on approach. The cultural center also includes the initiative Stadtwerkstatt itself, which consists of four departments: New Art Contexts, Discursive Media, Club Culture, Cafe Strom. The initiative servus.at runs its own cultural data center. It creates and features art dedicated to hacktivism, Open Culture and critical engineering. Radio FRO, the free radio, is producing and archiving citizen-run radio shows in Austria. The project Stadtwerkstatt, as a greater collective of all resident initiatives, is operating as a networked society, not getting tired of questioning the current situation of network disasters by aiming for and experimenting with alternatives.

Francine Xavier has selected ten works for the project 10x10x10 from the last 45 years of Stadtwerkstatt art works. The selection of the 10 artistic works of the Stadtwerkstatt (STWST) was made subjectively as an artist in a personal artistic context. The selection has nothing to do with the general position of STWST, which changes with the respective protagonists in various stages of development via a social debate. Francine Xavier worked in and for Stadtwerkstatt since 2008. Before this time, he headed the media art laboratory at Kunsthaus Graz, Silverserver and University of applied Arts Vienna. The selection criterion refers to a processual and generative art that was relevant for me with the new electronic media since the early 1980s. With the founding of the Stadtwerkstatt in 1979, it was an important alternative position in this new art context. The entire historical development of STWST can be found at our archive