From VUNU to nico bernath:
A New Name Above the Door
Nico Bernath reflects on a decade shaped by VUNU and on the quiet emergence of a new chapter now unfolding under his own name. Read the interview below.
Nico Bernath is a Slovak-Hungarian, Vienna-based gallerist and curator. For the past ten years he was running VUNU Gallery, which ended up having three locations across two countries. The gallery started in 2016 in a squat in Košice, an abandoned house with no electricity and no running water, and gradually established itself as one of the most relevant art spaces in the region. VUNU stepped into the art business only in 2024, opening its commercial branch in Bratislava, and a year later VUNU Vienna followed. Now, after ten years and just two brief years in the business, he decided to step back from VUNU’s commercial chapter and start a completely new, eponymous gallery: nico bernath. We met Nico at his small office and storage located on a hill in the middle of Bratislava’s diplomatic district. Until the new gallery space is ready, this is the temporary “HQ.” In the interview he speaks about the last decade with VUNU, and about the new chapter his own name will be connected to from now on.
So Nico, what’s all this mumbo jumbo about VUNU and a new thing called nico bernath, tell us more.
Well, I kinda love mumbo jumbo situations. To give you some facts, the past months, realizing VUNU will hit its ten years, I felt it’s time for some kind of reboot. Over the past two years, we opened a new location every May, first Bratislava, then Vienna, and it started to get pretty crazy with the intensity. In 2025, we did 18 shows plus fairs, and we are a small team. My personal assistant, Anita, started working with me only at the end of last year. So although it was a lot of fun, and it looked cool, there was a lot of personal struggle behind it as well. I remember Dries Van Noten answering, when asked what he does when things become too intense, and he just says “suffer.” I started to feel like that. So I knew that from May 2026 I wanted things to be different, but the idea of a new project came suddenly, just a few weeks ago.
How did you come up with the idea of a namesake gallery?
Christian Boros said that you can’t solve any problems, you can only replace them with new ones, huh. During the Easter holidays, I was visiting my family in a rural Slovak-Hungarian border area, far away from anything related to the art world. Sitting in my grandma’s kitchen, I called my friend, at the time, now a business partner, and said: “You know what, I have this idea. I want to put the most personal thing I own, my name, into it. Would you want to be part of it?” I thought he would say thanks, but no, but he liked the idea so much it was almost an immediate yes. The next days I spent in my car doing a 2000 km business trip, so I had a lot of time to think, which was great, because it all started growing. The fact it was during Easter time is funny, because I always say my decisions are more spiritual than strategic.
Before I ask more about nico bernath, there is a question which really interests me, what will happen with VUNU now?
I think VUNU is now in the best possible position, because it won’t be dependent on any particular physical space or structure. Of course we will keep our activities in the beautiful space in Košice, which artists and visitors love so much. VUNU Košice was always a non-profit operation, and even though I believe that in the art world everything can become profitable, it does not have to be money. It has the possibility to do great curatorial projects or work site-specifically, all the things a commercial gallery limits you in at some point. VUNU’s first show in Košice after the reboot is an international project called MOR+AL, which focuses on how mortality makes us actually alive, pretty symbolic. VUNU will also serve as a platform for institutional collaborations, such as Kunsthalle c/o VUNU.
How do you want to make it sustainable in the economy the art world is facing?
We definitely want to step into the business with both legs. The good thing is that we own our new space in Bratislava, so there will be no accountability to any landlord. The past two years there was a crisis and not only in the art market. Despite all the optimistic reports about multimillion sales, the real mycelium was struggling, which we saw as every month at least one important gallery shut down. Although it is important to say that even sadder than the market fluctuations, are the cuts from state funds supporting culture and institutions, especially when it comes to ideological decisions. The current government in Slovakia took over the funding schemes, but also the national gallery. It’s perverse. However, as I always say, hip hop wasn’t born with a funding structure or a dynamic market, and yet it’s the biggest music genre in the world. So I won’t let money cross my vision. (laughs)
“(…) Easter time is funny, because I always say my decisions are more spiritual than strategic.”
What are the plans with nico bernath?
The gallery is opening with a group show “To Cross Arms While Holding Hands,” bringing together five artists: Mária Bartuszová, Klára Hosnedlová, Zsófia Keresztes, Réka Lőrincz and Ľuba Šlechtová. I am very happy about this constellation. It brings together the legendary Mária Bartuszová, arguably the most internationally recognised Slovak artist, whose retrospective at Tate Modern in 2022 was an important moment for Slovak art on the global stage. We are also showing early work by Czech artist Klára Hosnedlová, who currently has a remarkable series of institutional projects around the world, and two exceptional Hungarian artists, Zsófia Keresztes and Réka Lőrincz, both of whom we have worked with before and certainly plan to collaborate with in the future. The five is completed by Ľuba Šlechtová, a young Czech painter whose work completely captivated me. The show will be open to the public from April 29.
How do you feel about the art scene in Bratislava?
It’s tiny, but you can definitely find many compelling artists. As I mentioned, Slovakia is currently politically challenged, but many people in culture fight on several fronts as best they can. We, apart from running our own program, together with Steinhauser Gallery and our friend, collector Gabriel Bishop, are organizing the first Gallery Weekend Bratislava in June. We brought all 12 commercial galleries under one umbrella, all this to help shape the artistic scene in the city and mainly motivate people from neighboring countries to visit Bratislava. For me personally, as I now live in Vienna and have a gallery there, the connection between these two cities is pretty important.
You mentioned Vienna, what is it like to operate across two countries?
Bratislava and Vienna are the closest capital cities in the world. This fact is often surprising, especially when I mention it to people in Vienna. The potential of two cities connected every hour by a 59-minute train and a highway with basically no borders has not been truly explored by either side. When I opened Bratislava two years ago, I knew this connection had to be part of the mission. I had no idea that a year later we would already be opening VUNU Vienna. It came unexpectedly, when friends were leaving a space where they had their architecture studio. I grabbed it without thinking, without calculations or plans, and I don’t regret it. It is a small space in a quieter but lovely part of the city center, close to the MuseumsQuartier, and from the very first opening a community started forming around the gallery.
“(…) hip hop wasn’t born with a funding structure or a dynamic market, and yet it’s the biggest music genre in the world. So I won’t let money cross my vision.”
And what does moving to Vienna mean for you personally?
You have to be here for a longer time to fully understand and experience how rich the cultural life is. What locals sometimes tend to call boring about the city, for me coming from Slovakia, is comfort and safety. There is also this certain heritage of the imperial era and a strong modernist spirit in the air, which creates a good cocktail of poshness and avant-garde. Not sure if it is my final destination. On the other hand I am lucky to see the whole city from my apartment’s window, and every morning before the madness starts and every night after it, I just watch the city and it makes me chill.
Any galleries that inspire you?
There are many to be honest, I am never too shy to give credit to those I respect. From the big players, I genuinely respect what Sadie Coles built up in London, or another remarkable female gallerist, Ursula Krinzinger, here in Austria. Also younger galleries with people behind them I regularly meet a few times a year at the fairs, like Cylinder from Seoul. You know that song from Drake called “No Friends in the Industry”? It is so true, but until you find them. So I definitely have to mention one of my best friends not only in the industry, Peter Bencze, with his team behind Longtermhandstand from Budapest. They hot.
What about the fairs and positioning the gallery in the international context?
As with all enigmatic things, I have a conflicted relationship also with art fairs. I remember going to Art Basel for the first time years ago, it was a real eye-opener. I love being at fairs as an exhibitor, but I also regularly visit some where we don’t even exhibit. As a gallerist, you need to be super smart about the whole thing. This February we did Feria Material in Mexico City for the first time and it was my best art fair experience ever. The Mexican art scene, venue, vibe, the amount of Mexican and US collectors and their appetite to collect. I genuinely think some European fairs should take lessons, and I am eager to explore this territory more. In July we are doing our first fair as nico bernath, Riga Contemporary, which is a nice boutique fair with a good lineup.
What can we expect from nico bernath going forward?
In the past months, maybe just to stay sane in the art business, I got absorbed by something completely opposite, the biographies of the big communist revolutionaries and thinkers, like Rosa Luxemburg or Leon Trotsky. And one sentence said by Eduard Bernstein stuck in my head: “The movement is everything, the final goal is nothing.” •
From VUNU to nico bernath:
A New Name Above the Door
Interview with Nico Bernath
O FLUXO is an online platform for contemporary art.
EST. Lisbon 2010
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