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Verena Walzl is an artist and writer. Working across installation, performance, poetry and curatorial practice, her work investigates language as sculptural material and explores questions of power, memory, human–animal relations and the politics of voice. Research plays a central role in her practice, often drawing on literature, philosophy and overlooked historical narratives.

Alongside her artistic work, she is part of a four-member curatorial collective developing long-term interdisciplinary projects that combine exhibitions, publishing, film, radio and public programming.

Walzl studied German Literature and Art History at the University of Graz and graduated in Textual Sculpture and Performative Art at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. She previously worked as an OeAD lecturer at the University of Prishtina and other universities in the region.

Education

2025
Academy of Fine Arts Vienna: Textual Sculpture (Heimo Zobernig) and Performative Art (Carola Dertnig)
HORSES – Saliva doesn’t drop off soft hands

2015
University of Arts Linz: Sculpture (Eva Grubinger)

2014
University of Graz & Charles University Prague: Diploma in Art History
Chasm, opening, cavity: Anthropogenic depressions in Land Art and the revelation of their human-nature relationship

2010
University of Graz: BA in German Studies
“There Was Earth in Them”. On Earth Metaphors in Paul Celan’s The No-One’s Rose

Exhibitions
(selections)

sprachlos, Young Visual Arts Award, GALERIE3/Künstlerhaus Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt
Softness controls Hardness (duo with Anaïs Horn), National Library of Kosovo, Prishtina (curated by Blerta Hoçia)
What we share, breakfast in Kosova or somewhere else, Grand Hotel, Prishtina
Sabine’s Transformation, literary contribution (print and audio) for the exhibition High Expectations by Anaïs Horn,
Austrian Cultural Forum, New York
2026

HORSES – Saliva doesn’t drop off soft hands, Diploma Exhibition, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
2025

Café Dasein, No Institute, Vienna, in collaboration with Eilert Asmervik
2024

Pallati i Ëndrrave, Festival Nën braza të kohës, Hadri Shehu Theatre, Gjakova
2023

82 Gërvalla 22, Festival Nën braza të kohës, Strellc
2022

Political Masturbation in Times of Uncertainty, City Gallery Klagenfurt (solo)
Rundgang, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (Heimo Zobernig)
2018

Les Traversées du Marais, Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris
Repérage Artistique #3, Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris
2017

Sphere 01, Mohsen Gallery, Tehran
paper-paper studios, Madrid (performance)
Kristallin #17, with Juan Camilo Herrera, Salzamt, Linz (performance)
Performance Artists Attract Crowds and Big Money, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
2015

Exhibiting Eye (performance by Anni Taskula, Agnieszka Pędziwiatr and Juan Camilo Herrera), Lentos Art Museum, Linz (stage design)
2014

hey production!, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
2013

Fragment de la Nuit, University of Arts Linz
Rundgang, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
2012

Prices / Grants / Awards

First Prize, Young Visual Arts Award, GALERIE3/Künstlerhaus Klagenfurt
2026

Artist Residency, Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris
2017

Kooshk Residency, Tehran
2015

2nd Prize, Carinthian Poetry Award, Klagenfurt
Scholarship, 17th Philosophicum Lech am Arlberg
2013

Publications

Der Schulweg. In: Im Fremden schreiben. Edition Atelier, Vienna.
Co-editor, Alexander Kluge dossier. Jeta e Re 2/2025.
2025

“Nagelneue albanische Namen ”. Stereotyping and Framing in Peter Handke’s Die Kuckucke von Velika Hoča. In: Peter Handke’s Jugoslawienkomplex.
Eine kritische Bestandsaufnahme nach dem Nobelpreis. Edited by Clemens Ruthner und Vahidin Preljević. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann.
2022

Bulls and Berries. In: Anaïs Horn & Eilert Asmervik, How do you feel about “Lou”? Amsterdam: Meta/Books.
“I’m very happy, very contented and – oh, but it’s difficult to act happy!” In: Anaïs Horn, Je suis malheureuse et heureuse. Amsterdam: Meta/Books.
2020

LICHTUNGEN. Journal for Literature, Art and Cultural Criticism (poems).
2016

“And Deliver Us from Ourselves. Comments on the Motives of Pain and Self-Discipline in Performance Art.” Student Magazine Graz.
Female Complicity for the exhibition IN-BETWEEN by Anaïs Horn, FLUCA Austrian Cultural Pavilion, Plovdiv, curated by Boris Kostadinov.
2013

Reviews

‘Rahma Khazam: “When the Sardine Tin Looks Back. On Nonhuman Subjectivity and Agency.” In: Springerin, Issue 1.
2019

Timo Brandt: Review of LICHTUNGEN 146.
2017

Lectures
(selection)

“Der Kreatur gefällt der Kriegsdienst nicht”. Alexander Kluge’s Pferde with Daniel Gönitzer), Alexander Kluge Workshop, University of Vienna
2026

Arts and Culture in Kosovo. GoEast DAAD Summer School, Center for Narrative Practice, Prishtina
2023–2024

Pure Soil and Dirty Holes. On Earth as Artistic Material and the Negative Form in Land Art and Earthworks of the 1960s. Project Space 17, Prishtina
2022

“World Wide Stage. On the Problem of Self-Thematization as an Artistic Strategy in the Age of Social Media.”Kunstverein Graz (performance lecture)
2013

Teaching

OeAD Lecturer, Department of German Language and Literature, University of Prishtina
2022–2024

Lecturer, Department of German Language and Literature, University “Ukshin Hoti”, Prizren
2022–2023

OeAD Lecturer, Faculty of Philology, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje
2022–2023

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