ARNOLD’S WISH

Video double projection

Installed at:
︎ Austrian Cultural Forum, Warsaw Autumn

© Anderwald + Grond

'In 50 years people will whistle my tunes in the streets', composer and artist Arnold Schönberg famously stated at the beginning of the 20th century. In 2017 we set out to fulfil Schönberg's often quoted wish. In the form of a multi-media installation titled Arnold's Wish we filmed and audio-recorded people (amateurs and professional musicians) who whistle Schönberg's tunes in an everyday setting. Thereby the locations of the filming (Vienna, Mödling, Los Angeles, Barcelona) reflect Schönberg's biography fleeing his home country of Austria to France and then the U.S.A. when the Nazi regime came to power. Moreover, the whistled tunes are chosen from the oeuvre he composed in these respective places, e.g. for the film shoot in Barcelona, around the corner from his house, a melody line of the opera Moses and Aron, that he composed while living there, can be heard.