Palace of Tears

Brixen Weeps

Palace of Tears

Vernissage

January 30, 2026, 5:30 pm
StadtGalerie Brixen

Ludwig Berger, Aron Demetz, Peter Kaser, Manuela Kerer, Urs Lüthi, Maurice Mikkers, Barbara Ungepflegt with Hanna Hollmann and Marie Vermont

Curator: Leander Schwazer

On January 30 at 5:30 pm, the exhibition Palace of Tears opens at StadtGalerie Brixen. It is the first exhibition curated by Leander Schwazer at StadtGalerie Brixen under the direction of the Südtiroler Künstlerbund. Contemporary artistic positions enter into dialogue with objects from the collections of the Hofburg Brixen and the Pharmacy Museum Brixen. At the center of the exhibition is a universal phenomenon: crying.

Tears are as diverse as the situations from which they arise. They can be an expression of grief and pain, of joy, overwhelm, relief, or release. “Like art, crying unfolds a transformative power,” says curator Leander Schwazer. In the exhibition, he connects religious images and objects that continue to shape the city history of Brixen with works by contemporary artists, tracing the phenomenon of crying in many different ways.

A microscopic photograph of a tear by Dutch artist Maurice Mikkers recalls a church window within the StadtGalerie, obscuring the view of a pitch-weeping figure by Aron Demetz. At the same time, Ludwig Berger’s sound work transforms the vaulted space of StadtGalerie into a glacier crevasse, where gurgling, bubbling, and rushing can be heard. These are the “tears” of a melting glacier, winding through the space like a stream—a poetic reminder that not only humans cry. Embedded within this soundscape is Peter Kaser’s painterly series depicting the “Stubenferner” glacier in Pflersch in warm, pop-inspired colors. Emotions are reflected in the surrounding landscape. The lamenting glacier song is interrupted by a composition for clarinet, violin, and cello by Brixen-based composer Manuela Kerer, which traces the weight of a single tear.

A special focus of the exhibition is the “Tear Saline”: StadtGalerie becomes a place where the people of Brixen are invited to cry, and from their tears the finest “South Tyrolean Tear Salt” is produced. Viennese performance artist Barbara Ungepflegt sets the saline in motion at the opening together with her collaborators and invites visitors to take part in this social sculpture for the duration of the exhibition.

Hardly anything is as socially stigmatized as crying—the convention of showing no weakness applies especially to men. Swiss artist Urs Lüthi depicts the state of shame in a merciless self-portrait showing the artist with a deeply flushed face.

The exhibition explores human and non-human crying and presents culture as a process of transformation: from one emotional state to the next, from crying to laughter and back again.

StadtGalerie Brixen

Palace of Tears / Palazzo delle lacrime
January 31 – April 4, 2026

Tue–Fri 10 am – 1 pm and 4 pm – 7 pm
Sat 10 am – 1 pm