Harry´s Blog

Schocken Books, 1985
Reviews and Comments - Pressestimmen
This fine bilingual anthology draws together the work of 45 contemporary Austrian poets. They are inheritors of a distinct literary tradition which combined strong linguistic self-consciousness with a tendency toward experimentation….This collection is of particular value because it makes many first-rate works of poetry available to the English public […]

Herbert Kuhner
“All I can see is Jews spreading out everywhere.
The Nazis were also fleeced in 1945.”
- Oskar Helmer: Socialist Minister of the Interior, 1945
“The exiles spent the war sitting in their club chairs
instead of suffering for Austria.”
- Leopold Figl, Conservative Chancellor, 1953
“Even if there were room, I doubt that Austria in the […]

Text of Brockhaus Encyclopedia add with photo of distinguished critic:
“He who knows much wants to know more.” […]

Herbert Kuhner
We were staying on the Isle of White with my wife’s aunt. There was a scandal at the time which was on page one of the broadsheets, as well as the tabloids. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had been caught having an extra-marital affair.
When the lady in question was interviewed, she said that she […]

The Pope and the Puritan
Herbert Kuhner
Pope Leo X was fat and ugly and as decadent as could be.
Before becoming Pope Leo, Giovanni di Medici teamed up with his cousin Giulio, who would become Pope Clement VII, to beseige and conquer Siena. The Medicis had been driven out of Florence, and when Sienna fell, Florence opened […]

Herbert Kuhner
“The true heroes of freedom are those who commit crimes run amuck and assassinate. It is only possible for man to realize himself by running amuck, by murder and by assassination….I would be glad if I had the strength to act like the assassins and those who run amuck. These are exceptional human achievements […]

Herbert Kuhner
Caligula appointed his horse as senator centuries ago.
That inane act keeps looking better and better -
considering the jackasses we have in Washington.
Concerning the Equidae Family and Bush-bashing,
there may be no sense in beating a dead horse,
but unfortunately this horse is still
in the political saddle.
Our Founding Fathers were a great bunch of guys,
and they initiated […]

Botticelli’s Fall
Herbert Kuhner
Let me pick an artist! I’ll take the great Sandro Botticelli. He painted beautiful paintings of beautiful women.
Take a trip to Florence! You’ll see woman in interiors and walking the streets, who could have stood model for him. Botticelli was interested in artistic form - but also in the female form. No myopic […]

Too Far Gone
Herbert Kuhner
Van Gogh’s predominant color is yellow, yellow as bright as the sun when it’s at its brightest.
In spite of the fact that his brother Theo was an art dealer, he never had an exhibit and he sold only one painting. He lived in the good old days of art, and many of […]

Integrity
Herbert Kuhner
Henri Rousseau was a simple man, and he had the integrity that only a simple man can have. He earned his livelihood as a customs official, but he was also a passionate painter. He continued to work at his job even after his paintings sold well. His colleagues were more sophisticated, and when they […]

They fight each other because they have no chance against Israel.
- Tony Judt, Die Presse, Vienna, June 14, 2007
Quite on the contrary,
Israel is the best thing that ever happened
to the Sunni-Shia, Hamas-Fatah divide
as well as all Arab divides in the Middle East.
There’s one thing that the Arab factions hate
more than Israelis - and that’s each […]

Herbert Kuhner
In the famous photo of Brecht, you can almost smell the tattered stogie. He’s is a dead ringer for Groucho, but without the pasted-on brows and mustache - and the sly humor. Besides having an aversion to the odor of the stogie, I’m put off by the shabby atmosphere of his plays and the […]

- Head of the Freedom Party - commemorates the Victims of the Allied Bombing during World War II on May 8, 2004 at Hero’s Square in Vienna
According to Herr Strache the bombing of German cities by the Allies was a crime. If that is the case, then it must follow that the bombing of Guernica, […]

Herbert Kuhner
The subject of Florentina Pakosta’s paintings is often the common man. He turns up in oils, dull and blunt in earthen and mud colors with touches of ochre, as well as in graphics. Sometimes he’s depicted singly and sometimes in crowds. When he appears in company, he usually appears in his own company, […]

Photographic Compositions by Barney Kulok
Barney Kulok’s exhibition of photographs at the Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery in New York
is aptly called “Simple Facts “The facts are indeed simple, and they lose their simplicity through the process of being photographed, only to find a new simplicity, in the best sense of the word. Kulok uses his lens like […]

Wer modern sagt
und modisch meint,
hat nichts kapiert.
- Padhi Frieberger, Objektkünstler, Photograph
He who says modern
and means fashionable,
understands nothing.
- Padhi Frieberger, object-artist, photographer

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Fritz Kleibel’s filmic exhibit, titled padhi.tv shown at Wienstation Gürtelbogen 28 on June 2, 2007 consists of a series of short films from 2 to five minutes long. His subject matter is the Austrian object artist and photographer Padhi Frieberger. We see Padhi at various locations at work, washing pots, walking to a brook with […]