Július Koller was born in 1939 in Piestany, he died in Bratislava in 2007.
Július Koller “found a new understanding of the social space of the city formulated in the approaches of the international avant-gardes critical of modernism, picking up from Dada and Duchamps, in Nouveau Realisme and Fluxus, in the ‘psychogeographical’ explorations of the Situationist International. This was a theme, from which it was possible to imagine a different position. Counter to the cynical technoid fantasies of omnipotence of the socialist state apparatus and its designers, or the gestalt-therapeutical ambitions of the fashionable modernists, the direct experience of the reality of the art work was to be returned to the individual. Starting from this idea, Koller has consistently developed his position up to the present day, and an oeuvre that in its stringency, obsession and peculiarity could well be called one of the most erratic and consistent of European contemporary art. It is perhaps most comparable with the universe of a Marcel Broothaers.” (Georg Schöllhammer)
In 1970 in conjunction with his U.F.O. Manifesto (Universal-Cultural Futurological Operations), Július Koller emphasized his interest in the self-initiative of the subject that is to shape future-oriented cultural situations. In the same year, Július Koller began to realize this approach in his action of an ongoing self-transformation into an “U.F.O.-naut”. This constantly transforming figure, which has manifested itself and been photo- graphically documented once each year since 1970, carries out various “operations”, which have different names but always include the abbreviation U.F.O. in the title. The photographic documentations of the “U.F.O.-nauts” show the artist in an annually modified form, a constantly changing character as a manifestation of personal life circumstances and as a commentary on the cultural and socio-political situation of each year. Over the course of years, Július Koller has thus transformed himself into a figure-sign, which connects with situations and configurations of everyday life through minimal actions and gestures, communicating ironically encoded messages in the abbreviation U.F.O. Every “operation” that Július Koller has subsequently carried out himself creates a “cultural situation” of this kind, which is oriented to “actively changing reality”.
Sport as a parallel and simultaneously real world became another playing field for Július Koller as the possibility of a “radical transformation of the idea of the work away from the object towards the trace of an action or an instruction for action” (G. Schöllhammer). In preparation for his solo exhibition in May 2003, Július Koller therefore delimited the exhibition space of the Kölnischer Kunstverein with white chalk markings, like those familiar from tennis courts and soccer fields. This action refers to a work from 1970, in which Július Koller set up a playing grounds ready to be used, open spaces for a communicative encounter. “The sports fields actually symbolize my attempt to prepare a terrain, similar to the way the new season is prepared each spring in tennis by removing the old ground cover and carrying out repairs. In the same way, I have prepared the surface for playing or for the arrival or the anticipation of something that could come from the cosmos. (…) It is basically a matter of individualizing the striving for understanding … Until 1968 we still had this idea that this understanding - or ‘democratic socialism’, as we called it then - could work better than it had done so far.” (Július Koller)
Group show including the work of Július Koller and Jiri Kovanda
The Walker Art Center, Minneapolis
November 11, 2023 - March 3, 2024
Biennial including the work of Július Koller and Majd Abdel Hamid
Kyiv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Uzhhorod, Lublin, Vienna, Warsaw, Berlin
October 2023 - 2024
Group show with works by Július Koller and Jirí Kovanda
The National Museum of Art of Romania, Bucharest
The National Center for Dance Bucharest, Bucharest
September 14 - October 1, 2023
Group show including the work of Július Koller
The Július Koller Society, Bratislava
June 9 - August 25, 2023
Group show with the works of Ryan Gander, Apostolos Georgiou, Július Koller, Jirí Kovanda, Hassan Sharif
gb agency, Paris
March 25 - April 22, 2023
Group show including the work of Július Koller and Jirí Kovanda
Musée d’Art Contemporain de la Haute-Vienne - Château de Rochechouart
March 3 - June 11, 2023
Group show with works by Július Koller
Fondazione Morra Greco, Palazzo Caracciolo di Avellino, Naples
September 29 - December, 2022
Art Fair
Art Basel, Messe Basel
June 14 - 19, 2022
Solo show
Nova Cvernovka, Bratislava
June 2 - October 30, 2022
Collective show with the works of Mark Geffriaud, Apostolos Georgiou, Tirdad Hashemi, Paul Heintz, David Horvitz, Július Koller, Jirí Kovanda, Roman Ondak, Pak Sheung Chuen, and Yann Sérandour
gb agency, Paris
May 14 - July 19, 2022
A collective exhibition by Yann Sérandour
gb agency, Paris
March 26 - May 7, 2022
Group show with works by Július Koller
Salle principale, Paris
March 13 - May 20, 2022
Group show with works by Július Koller, Roman Ondak, Cally Spooner
Frac Franche-Comte, Besançon
January 22 - March 30, 2022
Group exhibition
gb agency, Paris
October 19 - November 13, 2021
Group show with works by Július Koller
Palais des Beaux Arts, Paris
April 13 - May 23, 2021
Group show with works by Július Koller
Galerie der Stadt Schwaz, Schwaz
Until March 3, 2021
Group show with works by Július Koller
Arter, Istanbul
Until July 25, 2021
Květoslava Fulierová and Július Koller
gb agency, Paris
Exhibition from March 11 - May 30, 2020
Group show
gb agency, Paris
From November 30th 2019 to January 11th, 2020
Collective Exhibition
gb agency, Paris
Exhibition from Oct 12 to Nov 5, 2019
A solo show by Július Koller
gb agency, Paris
From May 11 to July 20, 2019
Solo exhibition
Arco. Ifema, feria de Madrid
February 22 - 25, 2018
A solo exhibition by Július Koller
gb agency
From 31 January to 21 March 2015
Frieze Art Fair
New York
May 9-12 2014
Group exhibition
New Museum, New York
January 24 – April 13 2014
Group exhibition
gb agency
January 11 - February 22, 2014
Inventing a Future, group exhibition
gb agency
January 26 - March 13, 2013
Solo exhibition
gb gallery
from June 2 to July 21, 2012
Group show
gb agency
7 May to 3 July 2010
Group exhibition
gb agency
27 March to 30 April 2010
Group show
gb agency
From June 25 to July 25, 2009
A solo show by Július Koller
gb agency
From June 2 to July 21, 2007
Group exhibition
gb agency
13 September to 8 November 2003
Július Koller
AMA, 2020
Soft cover
Editor: Daniel Grúň
Production and coordination: The Július Koller Society, Bratislava
Publisher: SCHLEBRÜGGE.EDITOR
ISBN: 978-3-903172-62-3
Dimensions: 23 x 30 cm
Language: English
340 pages
Július Koller
One Man Anti Show, Dokumentation, Documentation, Dokumentàcia, 2017
Publication
Daniel Grúň, Kathrin Rhomberg, Georg Schöllhammer (eds.)
Mumok - Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien
Július Koller
One Man Anti Show, 2016
Publication
Daniel Grúň, Kathrin Rhomberg, Georg Schöllhammer (eds.)
Verlag der Buchhandlung Walter König, Köln
Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien
Július Koller
Galéria Ganku, 2014
Monographic publication
Edited by Daniel Grúň
Published by Schlebrügge.Editor, Vienna, 2014
English/Slovak, 124 pages
numerous illustrations in b/w and colour
297 x 210 mm, softcover
ISBN 978-0-9570494-3-7
Július Koller
Science-FIction Retrospective, 2010
Book
texts by Petra Hanakova, Katarina Bajcurova, Kvetoslava Fulierova, Aurel Hrabusicky, Alexandra Kusa, Georg Schollhammer
366 pages, english/czech
© Slovenska narodna galeria, Bratislava 2010
ISBN : 978-80-8059-148-9
Július Koller
Július Koller: Univerzálne Futurologické Operácie, 2003
Book
Catalogue, edited by Kathrin Romberg, Roman Ondak, Kolnischer Kunstverein 2003
248 pages, with 185 illustrations
Essays by Georg Schöllhammer and Vít Havránek. Conversations with Hans Ulrich Obrist and Roman Ondak,
Text in German, English and Slovak.
Published by Verlag Walter König, Cologne 2003
ISBN : 3-88375-744-6