Blood Brotherhood

Dietmar Schwärzler: You made both a film and a gouache under the same title Blutsbrüderschaft (Blood Brotherhood), both very expressive in very different ways. What inspired those works? The blood brotherhood of the title refers to a ritual usually practiced between men …

Freidl Kubelka / vom Gröller: Hans Neuffer and I were so in love that it just felt right. It was his idea. Blood brotherhood is something like in Schiller’s poem The Hostage, which I’m thinking of right now: “So he went to his friend: ‘The king ordains, / That I atone with my life upon the cross / For my offending attempt, / Though he grants me three days’ time, / That I may see my sister married, / Provided that you stand as my guarantor / Until I come to dissolve the bond.’” That kind of heroic friendship lived in both of us, I think. Like a vow that we’d stand by each other—without ever saying it out loud. Maybe it was also just a relic from World War II …

Stefanie Reisinger: But it didn’t stay just a vow—the pledge of blood brotherhood was ac- tually carried out. In the film, the hands are raised high, very dramatically, and the blood coagulates on the figure’s palms.

From: Let´s Misbehave! Sometimes Rules Are Made to Never Be Learned. Conversation between Friedl Kubelka / vom Gröller. Stefanie Reisinger, Dietmar Schwärzler. In: Friedl Kubelka / vom Gröller. Home but Not at Home. Exhibition catalogue Belvedere 21, Verlag Buchhandlung Walther and Franz König, 2026.