Since the mid-1980s the Swiss artist Christian Philipp Müller (b. 1957 in Biel/ Bienne, Switzerland) has engaged in post-conceptual practices. Over nearly thirty years, and always in connection with a site-and exhibition-specific context, he has created a complex oeuvre comprising both installation and performance works. At the centre of his artistic practice is the analysis of the exhibition as a medium and of questions regarding the relationship between the object and its context. Müller approaches this thematic area from a variety of perspectives. On the one hand, he assumes the role of the exhibition curator, while on the other hand investigating these themes as an artist. Both as curator and in his artistic practice, he acts as a precise commentator of the art system. The work Vitrine was created for the exhibition Feste Wertel/Valeurs Fixes/Vaste Waarden/Fixed Values held in 1991 at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. Six years after his first public appearance as an artist, Müller took this first institutional solo exhibition as the framework for a pseudo-historical approach to his own artistic persona and his oeuvre. Central to the show were questions about the role and the function of the classic ‘artist biography' as well as the museal presentation of artifacts. In reference to the particular context, the objects were displayed within the exhibition space as though for a fictional auction. Showcases held a collection of props and objects taken from previous works and exhibition projects by the artist. The 'labels' referred to both the artist's work as well as to the site-specific context of the exhibition itself: the Art Nouveau building designed by Victor Horta in 1922, which houses the Palais des Beaux-Arts, also accommodated an auction house. Both the exhibition scenography and the design of the catalogue, which described and extolled the merits of the numbered objects and was made available to visitors, were references to the auction house connected to the museum. The profits gained from the auctions were used to help co-finance the museum, which began running at a loss soon after it was opened. Vitrine is taken from this exhibition and includes artifacts and documentary relics of performances, like admission tickets and photographs, as well as personal effects worn by the artist during particular performances-such as a pair of men's shoes or an old peaked cap. By choosing to present the objects with their own auction number in the Art Nouveau glass cases typically used during auctions, the artist was not only referring to the neighbouring auction house, but also to art history. The display cases are almost identical with the ones used by the Belgian artist Marcel Broodthaers for many of his works of institutional critique.