‘As important as Yoko Ono’s Cut Piece’
Peaches
I still remember the first time I saw that poster of Valie Export wearing crotchless trousers, her legs spread apart, a gun in her hand. It was a fearless image that took my breath away and has stayed with me forever.
Over the years, her work inspired my music. Her performance Tapp-und-Tastkino (Tap and Touch Cinema), where she strapped a tiny theater to her bare chest and invited people to reach through a small curtain, felt as important as Yoko Ono’s Cut Piece. It was up to the audience how they interacted with her, which could be hard to watch but always revealed something meaningful. I’m sad she’s gone.
Peaches is a Canadian musician and producer.
‘The female body is not a polite object’
Florentina Holzinger
I wrote a paper on Valie Export back in high school when I was 14. I’ve always taken legacy seriously; much of my own work revolves around what has come before and what those histories mean for us today.
It’s 1969 when Genital Panic happens. Valie walks into an experimental cinema in Munich wearing crotchless jeans. She moves slowly, row by row, forcing her exposed genitals to eye level with the seated audience.
View image in fullscreen: Painful to watch but always revealing … Tapp und Tastkino, 1968, by Valie Export. Photograph: No credit.
Fast forward to today. We find ourselves in a completely new landscape: we’re drowning in algorithmic thirst traps, free internet porn, and so on, not to mention the rotting political backlash trying to legislate bodies back into the dark ages. So yes: the core political need to challenge how we handle nudity and real bodies is still there. In fact, it’s become more urgent and complicated than ever.
Thank you, Valie, for paving the way and for stating this reality with such crystal clarity: the female body is not a polite object. It can be a registered trademark—a weapon to be exported directly against the structures we choose to fight. Rest in peace.
Florentina Holzinger is an Austrian choreographer and theatre director.
‘Passionate, brave, and certainly generous’
Joan Jonas
Valie Export was a very important artist. When I remember her, certain words come to mind: bold, radical, innovative, passionate, brave, and certainly generous. Her body was central—in confronting architecture made by men, for example, and in general as a vehicle for her many interactions. Several works are unforgettable, like Grope and Touch (1968), Genital Panic (1969), and Encirclement (1976).
View image in fullscreen: Bold, radical, innovative … Valie Export with Die Geburtenmadonna, 1972 in 2019. Photograph: Guy Bell/Alamy Stock Photo/Alamy Live News.
Her own words about Homo Meter II (1976) explain her position: “When I went out on the street with the loaf of bread tied around me and offered it as a gift, people were disturbed, unsettled, and curious. They didn’t dare to cut off a piece with a knife. The loaf of bread was also meant as an extension of the body, a provocation … as an artist, I was alone in many ways, and especially the confrontation with the public in public space was something very isolating.”
Joan Jonas is an American artist.
‘She made a virtue of civil disobedience’
Candice Breitz
View image in fullscreen: She put patriarchy on a leash … from The Portfolio of Doggedness with Peter Weibel, by Valie Export. Photograph: YouTube.
Valie showed so many of us—with her fierce attitude and badass style—that we didn’t have to live by the rules of people we couldn’t respect. As a feminist provocateur, she made a virtue of civil disobedience, always claiming space that had been dominated by men for far too long. In a 1968 intervention, she literally put patriarchy on a leash, dragging the legendary curator Peter Weibel through the streets of Vienna on all fours. Her legacy will live on not only in her work, but also through how she empowered those of us who follow in her footsteps.Candice Breitz is a South African artist.
“She understood the tools of mainstream media.” — Shoair Mavlian
“People were afraid of me”: the artist who turned her breasts into a cinema.
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Photography was central to Valie Export’s work. In her famous Body Configurations series, she placed her body in public urban spaces, twisting it to fit the architectural structures around her. She understood the power of using mainstream media tools and became one of the first female artists to critically examine how women are portrayed in mass media through photography and film. During her exhibition at the Photographers’ Gallery in 2024, she reflected on her use of photography in feminist practice from the 1960s onward, saying: “We used the camera’s aperture to see things with our own eyes, with our own thoughts.” Her radical use of photography—as a way to document, record, and question—influenced generations of female artists who came after her.
Shoair Mavlian is the director of The Photographers’ Gallery in London.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here is a list of FAQs about the article Her crotchless trousers are burned into my memory forever Valie Export as remembered by the artists she inspired
BeginnerLevel Questions
1 What is this article about
Its a collection of stories from other artists who were inspired by the radical Austrian performance artist Valie Export They share personal memories of her shocking work and how it changed their own art
2 Who is Valie Export
She is a pioneering feminist artist from Austria famous in the 1960s and 1970s for using her body in public to challenge how society looks at women She often used confrontational sexually explicit acts to make political points
3 Why does the title mention crotchless trousers
That refers to one of her most famous performances Action Pants Genital Panic She wore trousers with the crotch cut out walked into a porn cinema and confronted the audience directly The title shows how unforgettable that image was for the artists who saw it
4 Is this article just about one performance
No While the title highlights that one iconic moment the article covers many of her works including Touch Cinema and her early video pieces
5 Who are the artists quoted in the article
The article features quotes from wellknown contemporary artists like Marina Abramovi Cindy Sherman and others who were directly influenced by Exports work
IntermediateLevel Questions
6 Why was Valie Exports work so shocking at the time
Because she used her real unglamorous body to break taboos In the 1960s women in art were usually seen as passive objects Export actively controlled her own exposure forcing the audience to confront their own voyeurism and sexism
7 What is the main point of the article
It shows how one artists bravery can create a ripple effect The article argues that Exports confrontational style gave permission for later female artists to be more aggressive political and unapologetic in their own work
8 How does the article describe Exports impact on feminism in art
It explains that she wasnt just protesting sexismshe was redefining the female gaze
