Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza

ABOUT TBA21

Founded in 2002 by Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza in Vienna, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary (TBA21) represents the fourth generation of the Thyssen family’s commitment to the arts.

The TBA21 collection is the result of the foundation’s ongoing commitment to commissioning and disseminating multidisciplinary art projects that defy traditional categorisation, including large-scale installations, sound compositions, performance art and contemporary architecture. Because the foundation believes that art has the capacity to be a transformative force, it explores new modes of production and presentation that aim to provoke and inspire change. In 2015, Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza decided to dedicate the foundation’s unique programme to becoming an agent of change by focusing on the complexities and urgencies of the Anthropocene era.

TBA21 – Academy is the exploratory soul of the Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary and an itinerant site of cultural production and interdisciplinary research. Conceived in 2011 as a mobile platform on the oceans, it brings together artists, researchers and thinkers from diverse fields interested in today’s most pressing ecological, social and economic issues. Through its expeditions by sea and land, the Academy seeks to reinvent the culture of exploration in the 21st century, while encouraging the creation of knowledge, new modes of collaboration and the co-production of solutions to today’s pressing environmental challenges.