Edmund de Waal meets Albrecht Dürer at Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Over the past three years, Edmund de Waal has made repeated visits to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna–to view at first-hand a large number of objects both on display and in the museum’s storage rooms. The selection that he has made, gathered together under the title during the night, takes as its starting point the 1525 depiction of a nightmare by Albrecht Dürer, kept in a book belonging to the Kunstkammer. Other representations of dream, anxiety, disonance, disquiet and the moment of transition between waking and sleeping have been chosen from the Picture Gallery, the Kunstkammer, the collection of Greek and Roman Antiquities, the Library, the Collection of Historic Musical Instruments, the Imperial Treasury and the Kunstkammer at Schloss Ambras. Some will be familiar to visitors, and others less so. The exhibition will also include four objects from the Natural History Museum Vienna as well as a new work of art that Edmund de Waal has created especially for the exhibition in Vienna. The netsuke Hare with Amber Eyes, made famous by Edmund de Waal’s same-titled 2010 memoir, will also be on display.

Edmund de Waal is an artist and writer. Born in 1964, de Waal is best known for his large scale installations of porcelain vessels, which are informed by his passion for architecture, space and sound.