Gustav Metzger, "Auto-Destructive Art: The Activities of G. Metzger", Regie: H. Liversidge, 1965. Courtesy of Contemporary Films, London © The University of Westminster
Gustav Metzger
Film screening and reading
28.04.2026, 18:00
Kunstverein Nürnberg – Albrecht Dürer Gesellschaft
The artist and theorist Gustav Metzger (1926–2017) is regarded as one of the most radical and influential figures of the 20th century. Born in Nuremberg as a child of Jewish parents, he fled to the United Kingdom via a Kindertransport in 1939 to escape the Nazis. The experience of persecution, war, and suffering profoundly shaped his work. From the late 1950s, Metzger developed his pioneering concepts of Auto-Destructive Art, in which processes of destruction and transformation became both formal and politically effective artistic strategies. As Metzger wrote 1962 in „Machine, Auto-Creative and Auto-Destructive Art“: “Auto‑destructive art is conceived as a desperate, last‑minute subversive political weapon used by artists. It is an attack on the capitalist system and the production of war materials.”
As an artist, writer, and political activist, Metzger combined art, technology, and social responsibility, influencing subsequent generations of artists. Major solo exhibitions have been presented at Kunstraum München (1997), Kunsthalle Nürnberg (1999), Serpentine Gallery London (2009), and most recently at Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main (2024).
This year, Gustav Metzger would have turned 100. To mark this anniversary, Kunsthalle Nürnberg and Kunstverein Nürnberg – Albrecht Dürer Gesellschaft present a joint program on 28 April 2026 at 18:00 at the Kunstverein Nürnberg, dedicated to the artist’s work and thought. The event features Ken McMullen’s 2004 documentary “Pioneers in Art and Science: Gustav Metzger”, which explores Metzger’s experiments with computer-based “Liquid Crystal Light Projections” in the 1960s, as well as his integration of art, politics, and activism, including his co-founding of the Committee of 100 and his role as initiator of the legendary “Destruction in Art Symposium” in 1966. The film screening will be complemented by a reading of selected original texts by Gustav Metzger, performed by the author Anna Hofmann.
The commemoration builds on Michaela Melián’s project “Bringing Gustav Metzger Back to Nürnberg” (2025), curated by Wolfgang Brauneis and realized as part of Symposium Urbanum, continuing the effort to give Metzger’s artistic and intellectual legacy greater visibility and presence in Nuremberg.
