about

Martina Stapf is a Vienna-based visual artist and photographer working in the field of everyday performances. She studied fine arts at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna.

[artist statement]
Alongside my own artistic work, I regularly collaborate with performers, dancers and visual artists. In my photography, the examination of the body as a medium has become the central motif, in my own pieces as well as in the way I portray the expression of others. The body acts as a projection surface, from within and from without, shaped by social and physical relations. We move in patterns and identify ourselves through actions, spaces and relationships, in a continuous process of identification.

I work with the structures we encounter in everyday life: the movements of the human body in relation to its environment and to other people. I am interested in the relationship between human, material and space, and in the dynamics that become visible between them. Everyday places and objects, and an attentive way of handling them, often play a part in this. What moves us, consciously and unconsciously, all the time?

The body becomes a surface that is worked on in a performative act and captured through photographic fixation. For me, it is not enough to show the performance. I want to grasp the emotions and motivations behind a movement, and to continue them visually.

Martina Stapf | Foto © Franzi Kreis
Martina Stapf | photo © Franzi Kreis
1990
born in Eisenstadt, lives and works in Vienna
2012-2017
Academy of Fine Arts, class of Video & Videoinstallation, Dorit Margreiter; Vienna
2015
International Summer Academy of Fine Arts; Salzburg
2010-2011
Schule Friedl Kubelka, class for artistic photography, Anja Manfredi; Vienna
2009-2010
University of Vienna, art history; Vienna
fotoschule.at, digital photography class; Vienna
prizes | grants
2020
Vonovia Award for Photography Germany, Shortlist
2019
ArtStart_Studio, Atelier scholarship creative cluster, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
2017
grant for fine arts, Land Burgenland
artist in residence Paliano/Italy, Burgenländische Landesregierung
2014
merit scholarship, Academy of fine arts Vienna
2013
youth culture prize, Land Burgenland