Das Glück des grindigen Hansels

Performance and objects developed and presented at “Feldversuche Symposium” at Kleine Stadtfarm in Vienna in 2026.

Part of “Das Glück des grindigen Hansels" overlapped with Tomash Schoiswohl`s Performance “Pulcinellas Einkehr”.

The piece "Das Glück des grindigen Hansels" is oriented around the biography of Hans Glaser – a beggar, vagrant, and church thief who in 1669 was accused of sorcery in Graz and interrogated under torture. Engaging with the interrogation records and the work of the Styrian historian Helfried Valentinitsch opened up themes that have long accompanied my practice in new ways: the relationship between rural and urban space, shifting property relations, but also the capacity of individual agents to throw the seemingly orderly course of things into disarray – to be disruptive against the prevailing structures of power. Spanner in the works.

The questions that guide me in this are: To whom does the city belong? The land? Which are the stories that set people free, and which are the ones that seem to legitimize their oppression?

https://diefeldversuche.org/symposium-26/
https://tomashschoiswohl.xyz/

Further material on the persecution of beggars and the witch trials in Styria:

Bettlerverfolgung und Zaubereiprozesse in der Steiermark, Helfried Valentinitsch

photo credit: Peter Oroszlany
coverphoto: Amanda Pina