Galerie nachst St. Stephan is one of Austria's, and indeed Europe's, most eminent and distinguished galleries for contemporary art. Located in the same place in the heart of Vienna since the 1920's it has been exploring the art of the modern era for nearly ninety years. With the exhibition 'Signs, Waves, Signals - Reconstructive and Parallel' Rosemarie Schwarzwalder, the gallery's director since 1978, presented in 1984 a program featuring basic elements that have proven relevant in numerous solo and group exhibitions up to the present. 'Rift Gap Hinge A' documents an internationally recognised exhibition staged at Galerie nachst St. Stephan in 2006/07. Curator and artist Heinrich Dunst had put together work by international artists, driving the trained relationship between media and sign, between the visible and the expressible to the extreme. The show made traceable the illuminating relation between visual art, film and literature. By transposing the display of art works into a book 'Rift Gap Hinge A' extends and consolidates at the same time the scope in the relation between art and its depiction.
More than 70 photographs of art works and the exhibition are complemented by detailed descriptions of the works and an introductory essay. The artists represented in the exhibition include: John Baldessari, Konrad Bayer, Marcel Broodthaers, Rafal Bujnowski, Ernst Caramelle, Clegg & Guttmann: Michael Clegg & Martin Guttmann, Heinrich Dunst, Rainer Ganahl, Nikolaus Gansterer, Louise Lawler, Jan Mancuska, Christian Marclay, Michael S. Riedel, Ferdinand Schmatz, Peter Tscherkassky, JoA"lle Tuerlinckx & Remy Zaugg .