Wien, Oktober 2015 A DISCUSSION WITH INCOMING DIRECTOR MATTI BUNZL SETTING FORTH EMPHASES AND PROJECTS FOR THE WIEN MUSEUM Press conference: Thursday, 20 October, 10 a.m. Venue: Wien Museum Karlsplatz, 1040 Vienna Press photos: www.wienmuseum.at/en/press Statement by City Councillor for Culture, Andreas Mailath-Pokorny: “When we were searching for a new Wien Museum director last year, the choice that fell to us was an easy one: Matti Bunzl. He convinced us not only with his competence and concept for the museum. He also radiated the energy and enthusiasm necessary to carry on the Wolfgang Kos success story,” stated City Councillor for Culture, Mailath-Pokorny. “That initial impression did not disappoint. Already in his capacity as director-designate, Matti Bunzl immersed himself in the cultural life of Vienna, among other things serving as a jury member for the international architectural competition to design the new Wien Museum. I am convinced that, together with Financial Director Christian Kircher, Bunzl will successfully lead the city museum through these challenging times of transition, and that he will ensure that the Wien Museum maintains its presence in Vienna during its temporary closure.” Emphasized Mailath, “I wish him all the best in his endeavour to implement his vision for the new Wien Museum as a ‘laboratory of civil society’ where citizens find themselves on the trail of the city (der Stadt auf die Spur).” 1/9 THEMES: Internationalization “It’s about presenting Vienna in a global context – Vienna from a global perspective that is both historical and contemporary.” Bunzl named two events that stand out as exemplary of the tone he seeks to set. On the first evening of his directorship, Bunzl will engage in a dialogue on the history of Austria and Vienna with the internationally renowned historian, Pieter Judson, who teaches at the European University Institute in Florence. The title of the event is “Vienna Seen Globally.” Other top international scholars will again be guests of the Wien Museum in the near future. Among them is Timothy Snyder, specialist in Eastern European history and the Holocaust, who will introduce his new book, Black Earth , on October 21 in the Wien Museum. Also in keeping with this international orientation is the new academic advisory council, which will come into being on October 1. Bunzl was able to acquire the services of the following experts who will sit as members of the advisory board: Pieter Judson (Chairperson), historian at the European University Institute, Florence; Daniela Hammer-Tugendhat, art historian at the University of the Applied Arts, Vienna; Albert Lichtblau, historian at the University of Salzburg; Maria-Regina Knecht, vice-director and literary scholar at Webster University, Vienna; Birgit Lodes, music scholar at the University of Vienna; Randeria Shalini, rector at the Institute of Human Sciences, Vienna, and social anthropologist at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva; Christoph Reinprecht, sociologist at the University of Vienna; Clemens Ruthner, literary scholar at Trinity College, Dublin; Brigitta Johanna Schmidt-Lauber, ethnologist of Europe at the University of Vienna; Bernhard Tschofen, scholar of empirical culture at the University of Zürich; Heidemarie Uhl, historian at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna; and Larry Wolff, historian at New York University. “The future will see the Wien Museum positioned even more strongly as a place of discussion (Ort des Diskurses), especially in relation to salient current themes and hot topics in the city and in society.” Two events emerge as paradigmatic. The new “2x45 Minutes” format, in which two highly-charged themes will be discussed back-to-back by experts in their respective fields, premiers on December 1. The intertwined themes of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia will start things off, with Julya Rabinowich, Vladimir Vertlib, Farid Hafez und Dudu Kücügöl taking part. Sets of themes envisioned for the future include cyclists/motorists and public space/private speculation respectively. Also of contemporay relevance is the upcoming event for students that will take place on October 14. The event’s motto is “Bring your prejudices and put them to the test.” Nina Horaczeck and Sebastian Wiese’s book, Against Prejudice (Czernin Verlag), provides the backdrop and occasion for the event. Workshops will bring together students and museum visitors alike to analyze prejudices such as racism and homophobia. 2/9 The New Museum Building A final sitting of the prize jury will convene at the end of November to determine the winning design project. The winner will be announced directly after the jury determination, and the design models will be unveiled as part of a presentation in the atrium. Upcoming Exhibitions in 2016 The exhibition program for 2016 has been printed on a single sheet in the press packet. Following are three highlights of the Wien Museum exhibition calander for 2016. Early in the year, the museum will present a look back on the 250-year history of Vienna’s Prater in an exhibtion curated by Wien Museum vice-director, Ursula Storch. During the fall exhibition season, the Wien Museum will mount the first-ever large-scale exhibition recounting the history of sexuality in Vienna. Inspired by Michel Foucault, the exhibition adopts a cultural-historical perspective to explore modern sexuality as an urban invention. A further highlight in the fall is an exhibition of photographs by Robert Haas, one of the most important Austrian representatives of interwar photojournalism. Haas was forced to emigrate to the USA in 1938 and continued his occupational path as a graphic designer. The Wien Museum has recently purchased Haas’s archive of photographs. The Chapel of St. Virgil (Virgilkapelle) “Like hardly any other edifice in Vienna, the Chapel of St. Virgil allows us to experience a chapter of the city’s history, a chapter that nonetheless still poses many questions. For good reason the Middle Ages continues to fascinate us,” stated Matti Bunzl, the new director of the Wien Museum. One of the best-preserved and largest medieval interiors, the Chapel of St. Virgil has been carefully and elaborately restored after its 2008 closure for conservation reasons. From December 12, the restored chapel interior will once again be open to public viewings. This 800-year-old auratic space will be complemented in the future by a small permanent exhibition on medieval Vienna. A Flexible Museum “Even though our core task is the conservation and research of objects, a museum has to be able to react quickly to events.” On the very day the new director took up his post, the Wien Museum set up an installation right in front of its door dealing with an urgent contemporary theme. Asylum-Space is an installation that engages with the influx of refugees into postwar Vienna, from the Hungarian refugee crisis of 1956 to the arrival of refugees from Bosnia in the 1990s. 3/9 AUSSTELLUNGSPROGRAMM 2016 O.R. SCHATZ & CARRY HAUSER: In an Age of Extremes 28 January through 16 May 2016 (Opening: 27 January 2016) Two Viennese artists between the two world wars, between Expressionism and New Objectivity, between the art of painting and the art of the book-making. Two painters awaiting rediscovery. Otto Rudolf Schatz (1900-1961) and Carry Hauser (1895-1985) are significant Austrian artists whose work has remained hidden in the shadows of their more famous contemporaries such as Kokoschka. Because the artists were active principally in the realm of graphic design, their work was rarely exhibited internationally. War, exile, and the radically shifting terrain of twentieth-century political systems left their stamp on the artists’ biographies. The exhibition establishes a contrast between two incongruous artists whose work reflects a turbulent half-century. Placing the work of Schatz and Hauser into dialogue holds open the possibility of discussions about a broad spectrum of artistic expression ranging from Cubism and Expressionism through New Objectivity to the realism of the postwar years. MEET ME AT THE PRATER! Viennese Pleasures since 1766 10 March through 21 August 2016 (Opening: 9 March 2016) On the seventh of April 1766, Joseph II granted public access to the Prater imperial hunting grounds. The 250 th anniversary of this event presents a prime opportunity to focus on the diverse and varied history of the Prater. In its early stages as a public space, the Prater was an area both rich in nature and near the center of the city – an area that offered wide-open space for spectacular mass events such as scenic firework displays and experimental hot-air balloon flights. Gastronomic enterprises -- lemonade stands, snack booths, guest houses, and coffee houses along the main promenade -- began settling into the Prater as early as the eighteenth century. The Panorama opened in 1801, giving visitors the illusion that they 4/9 were in a foreign city when they stood in the midst of the giant painting that surrounded them. In the Circus Gymnasticus, visitors could attend magic shows. With the rerouting of the Danube Canal in the lead-up to the World Exhibition of 1873, the Prater entered into a period of efflorescence. Imaginative and fanciful innovations like the flower parade (Blumenkorso) and the “Venice in Vienna” theme park contributed to the further enhancement of the Prater’s image. The Rotunda and the Riesenrad (Vienna’s giant Ferris wheel completed in 1987) quickly became Viennese landmarks. After the First World War, the Prater’s entertainment offerings became increasingly modest. To be sure, large sporting events and the first exhibitions of the Wiener Messe (Vienna Fair) took place there until the Rotunda burned down in 1937, but all in all, the Prater became a more sober and matter-of-fact place. The time of luxuriant festivals and spectacular events came to a decisive end with the extensive destruction wrought during 1944 and 1945.