msaxl

Viennese artist and educator, Marianne Saxl-Deutsch, born on this day in 1885 (†1942, murdered at the Treblinka death camp) produced some of the iconic posters used in the original push for women’s suffrage (and revived when society goes retrograde). Still under copyright during the Women’s Liberation Movement of the 1970s (entering public domain in 2013), her work was often used without attribution—her signature MSAXL cut out and leading to her not being remembered as she should have been.

paneuropäisches picknick

Held on this day in 1989 the peace protest known as the Pan-European Picnic in the border town of Šopron (formerly Ödenburg), Hungary on the Austria border sponsored in part by the former Archduke of both nations is considered by many to be the final death-rattle of Communism, presaging what was to follow in Central Europe, signalling the end of accommodation for protracted situations like Romanian refugee camps in Hungary or the East German encampment at the Prague embassy. Borders were eliminated for a space of three hours during the exchange and many took advantage of this window, with border guards given orders not to interfere. Presently, few signs remain of the walls that separated east from west.

meine tochter nimmer mehr

Featured in Amadeus, a favourite of the endearingly incompetent Florence Foster Jenkins and dispatched to the Cosmos on the Golden Records of the Voyager emissaries, we’re all familiar with the challenging coloratura passage, the trilled run spanning two octaves, of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte but I failed to appreciate the piece’s message and that it’s classified as a rage aria (which sounds quite fancy—Yas Queen, the Italian terms being aria agitate or aria infuriate).
Entitled “Hell’s Vengeance Boils in my Heart” (Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen), the Queen of the Night delivers a knife to her daughter Pamina and on pain of disownment, assassinate her arch-rival, the high priest Sarastro, whom had recruited her daughter and would be rescuer Prince Tamino and sidekick Papageno to his school of thought. Familiar with her vocal talents, Mozart wrote the part for his sister-in-law Josepha Hofer who first played the role, with words by librettist Emanuel Schikaneder—whom himself played the part of bird-catcher Papageno in the opera’s premiere.

ibiza-gate

Though the story is still evolving and it is uncertain whether the scandal will precipitate the collapse of the coalition conservation government of Sebastian Kurz, an Austrian tabloid has secured a two-nights’ stay at the luxury villa on the Spanish holiday island where the 2017 meeting took place between woman posing as the niece of a Russian oligarch reportedly was able to secure public contracts in exchange for the promise of election help (in the form of buying a newspaper and turning it into a propaganda machine) from the now ousted vice-chancellor that will be awarded to a lucky reader. We can understand the concept of disaster tourism and the lure of a free get-away, regardless of the destination, and the importance of combating creeping corruption and influence peddling is crucial but I think maybe it is a touch shameless to be occurring in real-time.

ad mensam

Schloß Hollenegg (DE) outside of Graz (the summer residence of the House of Liechtenstein) is no stranger to hosting unique exhibitions and the latest installation by curator Alice Stori Liechtenstein is no exception—with twenty-one site specific pieces throughout the castle’s sculleries and dining hall that explore table manners and dining etiquette as a social wedge that goes beyond the act of nourishment to afford all the chance to gather together and a place at the table (the Latin title). Much more to explore and chew over with Dezeen at the link above.

vienna convention

In a move that seems particularly American and symptomatic of its McWorld mentality, US citizens travelling in Austria who’ve lost their passport or are otherwise distressed may seek out consular services and relief at any one of the country’s nearly two hundred McDonald’s franchises.
Fast food staff, thanks to a deal reached between the company and the US State Department, will have a special hotline to reach the Embassy to relay emergencies and seek resolution. A spokesperson for the US Mission says that this partnership is not in lieu of a fully staffed and trained diplomatic corps and is in fact increasing access to the embassy by distributing services throughout the country, choosing McDonald’s for this pilot programme because of its geographic spread, after-hours staffing and familiarity to Americans.

musterküche

Via the always brilliant Nag on the Lake, we learn about the Frankfurt kitchen (die Frankfurter Küche), which transformed our relationship to food preparation, dining and living, created by interbellum designer Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky (*1897 – †2000) and first Austrian woman to be credentialed as an architect.
Assigned the task of creating the kitchen spaces for a new, post-war housing project to rebuild Frankfurt am Main in 1926, Schütte-Lihotzky took inspiration from the efficiencies of railway dining cars and created kitchens for hundreds of thousands of units and though perhaps not as narrow, one can detect elements of Schütte-Lihotzky’s vision and basic layout in our own new kitchen. Sensing the eminent fall of the Weimar Republic, she and other architects joined Ernst May—the chief designer behind the New Frankfurt project and other rebuilding and re-housing efforts to form the “May Brigade” and went off to the Soviet Union to help with Stalin’s Five Year Plan. Once conditions again became untenable during the Great Purge (Большой террор, 1937 – 1938), their group became unrooted again and Schütte-Lihotzky settled in Chicago and worked on the World’s Fair Century of Progress exposition.

die unendliche anziehungskraft der natur

Inspired by a sketch executed in 1971 by fellow Austrian Max Peinter (*1937, a cousin of Ettore Sottsass) called “The Unending Attraction of Nature” art collector Klaus Littmann will bring the picture to life by transplanting a forest of trees in the sports stadium of the industrial city of Klagenfurt as public art installation of the same name.
Calling the government officials out for their inaction on climate change and habit loss (lifestyle choices do matter and have an impact but the real and difficult sacrifice is in legislating the polluters), Littmann fears that in the near future, such displays of Nature might in fact be within the purview of the viewing platform or gallery, like animals in zoos. They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum. Once the project concludes (9 September – 27 October 2019), the trees will be given a permanent home at a nearby location on public lands.

lift up the receiver, i'll make you a believer

In addition to permitting a scaffolding hung with the inscription, “So long as God wears a beard, I will be a feminist,” in the city’s cathedral, Innsbrucker Bishop Hermann Glettler (EN/DE) has also allowed artist Manfred Erjautz to install a salvaged wooden crucifix in the sanctuary of the Spitalskirche whose broken arms tell the time. “Your Personal Jesus” will be on display throughout Lent for comtemplation.  More to explore at the links above.  

a fifth of beethoven

Though our favourite Line Rider doodle remains Edvard Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King, we also enjoyed very much the intricate slalom to Ludwig von Beethoven’s Opus 67, via Pasa Bon! The familiar and establishing long-long-long-short conceit represents Fate knocking at the door and was suggested by the composer’s amanuensis, Anton Schindler.

wahllokal

After having secured the right to vote and stand for public office the preceding November, women in Germany and Austria for the first time had the occasion to participate in the democratic process on this day in 1919 during federal elections (Nationalversammulung)—the Austrian constituent assembly elections were held a few weeks later on 16 February.

stille nacht

Composed in 1818 by Franz Xaver Gruber and set to lyrics by Father Joseph Mohr in Oberndorf bei Salzburg and first performed in the parish church of Saint Nikola on Christmas Eve two centuries ago, residents are expecting twice the number of holiday tourists to descend on their town for this anniversary spectacle of Silent Night.
Declared an intangible work of cultural heritage by UNESCO in 2011, schoolmaster and amateur organist Gruber was only rehabilitated and acknowledged for creating the melody of the carol in 1995 when the lost, original manuscript was recovered, credit having been traditionally attributed to more famous Austrian composers like Haydn or Beethoven. The venue this year’s concert is not exactly made clear as the original choir was demolished around 1890 after a devastating flood sweep through the area, but the chapel curiously (or predictably) was rebuilt as a full-sized replica in the city of Frankenmuth, Michigan, a place settled by a group of disaffected Lutherans from Fürth, near Nürnberg—which bills itself as the Christmas capital of the world. Most of the over three hundred different languages versions of the song are more or less true to the German original though “Round you Virgin Mother and Child, Holy Infant so tender and mild” is better translated “Round yon godly tender Pair, Holy Infant with curly hair”—Nur das traute hoch heilge Paar, Holder Knab’ im lockigen Haar

wiener methode der bildstatistik

Having had a previous encounter with the ISOTYPEs of Marie and Otto Neurath (*1882 – †1945), we appreciated revisiting this subject with an in depth exploration from Open Culture that regards the universal character set as yet another among many earnest attempts to foster peace and empathy through an international language, a utopian effort like Esperanto and others. With the help of woodcut artist Gerd Arntz, this visual vocabulary grew to over four thousand pictograms to structure and address every facet of society and of course prefigures our contemporary use of symbols and data visualisations.

frauenwahlrecht

Following the November Revolution that ignited with the abdication of the Hapsburg and German emperors and subsequent truce, this day marks the centenary of universal suffrage in Austria and Germany with both women and men aged at least twenty (down from twenty-five from prior to Great War) being able to vote and stand for public office in any and all elections.
For the people of Germany, this pronouncement was legally ratified on 30 November 1918 and was to shortly thereafter be tested in the field and at the polls with federal elections called for the Weimar Republic in January 1919. Austria held Constituent Assembly (Konstituierende Nationalversammung) elections in mid-February. Though activists all over had been working towards the enfranchisement of women for years and the struggle for equal representation continues, political will acquiesced in part because so many millions had perished in the fighting and constituencies were more and more reliant on the votes of women to confer confidence and mandate.

6x6

spitzmaus mummy in a coffin and other treasures: Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum’s guest curators, Wes Anderson and Juman Malouf

siss-boom-bah: antique Japanese fireworks catalogues

invaderz: a twist on the classic arcade game whose advancing armada evolves (relatedly) during play

a declaration of future independence: antiquarian JF Ptak shares the scarce text of Czechoslovakian president Edvard Beneš’ nullification of the Munich Agreement, which was promised to usher in “peace in our time”

not the stockholm syndrome: Swedish capital takes a stand on the privatisation of public spaces (previously), via Super Punch

暦:dioramist and art director Tatsuya Tanaka (previously) is sharing a daily calendar of his miniatures assembled from the everyday, via Nag on the Lake   

6x6

subraum: underground photography from Gregor Sailer—via Coudal Partners’ Fresh Signals

hängematte: an inviting house of hammocks in Vienna’s museum district

this too shall pass: inspired biodegradable packaging for foodstuffs

audio artefacts: Conserve the Sound curates disappearing noises of obsolete technology

demersal zone: oceanographers discover a hidden deep water reef off the Carolina coast in the Atlantic, via Slashdot

your show of shows: the New York Times shares a nice tribute to academic and playwright Neil Simon 

das kleine fade gehirngefühl

We appreciated the distinct privilege of tagging along on Hyperallergic’s sojourn to the Outsider Art locus of Austria, the Maria Gugging Psychiatric Clinic on the outskirts of Vienna, known for its dedicated art therapy programme.
Unlike the Prinzhorn collection in Heidelberg that was began in the 1920s and hidden from the Nazis to prevent confiscation and destruction as degenerate art, the residents at Gugging were not encouraged to find creative outlets until the late 1950s when Doctor Leo Navratil (*1921 - † 2006) invited people under his care to express their feelings and state of mind through painting, emerging from the institute’s dark past during Nazi occupation which saw some of the most barbaric experimentation on patients. Having discovered many talented individuals within his empanelment, Navratil showcased artists in Viennese museums and galleries and went on to establish a permanent gallery and education centre on the campus in 1981 called Haus der Künstler. A separate pilgrimage, a visit to Gugging by Brian Eno and David Bowie informed the collaborators’ production strategy for the 1995 concept album 1. Outside. Read more about the artists and the institution at the link up top.

außenpolitische beziehungen

Stoking further incredulity by granting an interview to a far-right news outlet and expressing rather undiplomatically his ambitions to empower conservatives across Europe and the announcement inviting the conservative Austrian prime-minster for a luncheon, there are increasingly vocal calls for the expulsion of the newly-credentialed US ambassador to Germany.
Describing such outreach and partisanship as further undermining already strained trans-Atlantic relationship, Germany knows that harbouring such political sentiments would not be tolerated in Washington and should neither be suffered kindly in Berlin. Embassies are diplomatic missions, whereas consulates—in the traditional sense, were outposts to promote the sending country’s business interests and while consular services have become an extension of the diplomatic mission itself, corporate and ideological concerns were generally kept at a distance from statecraft. Now compromise and conciliation have been removed briskly from the hands of master negotiators and deal-makers and thrust into the hamfisted realm of senseless and destructive barriers to trade—to which the rest of the world is responding with targeted, retaliatory tariffs that are designed to punish constituencies allied with the Trump regime, possibly influencing the course of elections over jobs-security.

eu 2016/679

Just days after going into effect, two internet giants, the Daily Dot reports, are facing suits in the billions for failure to comply with the GDPR, for as characterised by the Austrian privacy and consumer-rights advocate who brought the complaint despite eighteen months to prepare themselves for the new standards (imagine had they not just flaunted the coming change or indeed how different the world might be today had the regulation gone into force upon passage) still are offering users only an all-or-nothing means of opting out, which is no choice at all and contravenes the spirit of the regulation.
The companies responded predictably with continued commitments to the GDPR’s provisions and how privacy-protections are built into every stage of the user-experience. While many websites seem to have put together some wearying slap-dash boilerplate message in a last-minute, reactionary fashion—even the biggest ones with an established presence in Europe, many smaller services that harvest visitors’ data directly or indirectly—especially second-tier news-outlets have simply gone dark for Europeans until such time as they can be reasonably assured (and thus safe from legal consequences) that their accessibility isn’t afoul of the law.

solve for x

With the exception of noted jerks like Edison and Ford, we’d like to think that our forward-looking titans of physics are above reproach and honest-brokers that give credit where credit is due, but I was rather deflated and despondent to learn how Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen rather brazenly took all the praise and recognition away from a fellow physicist for the discovery of x-rays.  Ivan Puluj (who did not win the Nobel prize and does not have a chemical element and a mountain in Antarctica named after him) taught with Röntgen at the University of Vienna, and Puluj’s focus was on research into the nature of beams of electrons (cathode rays) and how those might be harnessed and designed what was dubbed a Puluj lamp (tube) to produce and direct them. Recognising the potential for medical imaging, Puluj even produced photographs of skeletal structures—at a higher qualities than those that Röntgen exhibited—not with electrons but rather with a collateral, hitherto unknown ray and apparently his inability to couch his discovery in the latest terminology cost him the honours.