Defrosting The Icebox

Raid The Icebox 1 with Andy Warhol (1969–1970) is seen as one of the earliest examples of a collection exhibition curated by an artist. Though the Warhol-curated exhibition did not feature any works by the artist himself, it contained several presentation strategies that broke with traditional museum standards: Instead of prioritizing the visual arts, Warhol exhibited the applied arts. Instead of applying a classification system of chronology, medium, or style, he presented the objects in an ahistorical, nonhierarchical form. The museum storage became an exhibition; what had almost been forgotten was placed in the limelight. Taking inspiration from Warhol’s atypical list of works—among other things, he presented 7 blankets, 12 sculptures, 17 chairs, 57 umbrellas, and 194 pairs of shoes—the focus here is placed on selected works from the Weltmuseum Wien Collection as well as Greek and Roman sculpture fragments from the Antiques Collection of Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien.