Birgit Ramsauer

As an international performance artist, I live and work in Berlin and New York.

I see myself essentially as a performance artist who not only places her own body and personality in different social contexts, but also consciously leaves visible traces. In the tradition of American and German performance art, I intervene in other people’s contexts and mark the accidental traces that other people unconsciously leave behind.
In my performances, I act as a moderator and visual translator of everyday, rather inconspicuous human actions that can take place anywhere in the world. In doing so, I carry out a kind of culture-specific analysis on several levels with the “securing of traces”, because the actual act of performance is always preceded by a detailed study of the spaces and society.

After my training at the Nuremberg Art Academy, I became known for my work in the public space of metropolises – including the project “ART : HOME – LESS” (Daad NYC, Kolodzei Foundation/USA Moscow, Triangle France Marseille, Museum of Forbidden Art, Berlin). In “Sand in the gear” in Chicago, “Heteropias” Moscow, Berlin and “People Drawing” Berlin, Moscow, Strasbourg, Nuremberg, “Spinet – an experiment on total art work” NYC, Berlin, Bamberg, Nuremberg, Odessa, as well as in the sound installations “18 Scenes with Meier”, Arpmuseum Rolandseck, and “Ich bin keine Bildhauerin!” Gerhard Marcks Haus, Bremen, I am constantly finding new ways to further develop and expand the concept of performance. I have been supported by numerous grants and prizes such as the Else Heiliger Fund of the Adenauer Foundation, ifa Foundation, Drexel Foundation, Atlanta Nexus Centre, Kurt Eisner Foundation.

My work is shown in museums (Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin, Ystad Kunstmuseum, Art Forum Berlin, Städtische Galerie + Kunsthalle, G. Marcks Haus Bremen, Arp Museum, Maly Manege, Modern Art Museum Moscow, The Cooper Union Great Hall NY, Lenin Museum, Museum of Contemporary Art Jekaterinenburg, Modern Art Museum Marseille) and galleries in USA, Europe and Russia.
I teach at Cooper Union, City College, Columbia, NYC, Atlanta Tech, TU Dresden, HKS Ottersberg, Art Akademie Riga, among others. As an experimental video artist I am a member of the Millennium Filmforum, NYC and founded the Munich International Art Film Festival. I was also a juror at the Hamburg International Short Film Festival.