Albums

Lights off, spotlight on: 1,000 glass slides and the first slide lectures of the Volkskundemuseum Wien

The first 1,000 slide numbers in the inventory of the Volkskundemuseum Wien (Austrian Museum of Folk Art and Folk Life) were primarily produced between 1900 and 1927 for (popular) scholarly slide lectures, often focusing on geographical and cultural aspects of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. As early as around 1900, many of these glass slides were used by museum staff in so-called "sciopticon lectures" (from Greek dia = through, skopein = to look). However, a systematic cataloguing and inventorying of the slides only began around 1915. The corresponding entries are usually limited to a brief description of the depicted subject. Additional information – such as details on production or use – is almost entirely lacking.

Only the clear thematic structure of the inventory book provides clues about the content of the lectures illustrated by these images. Lecturers with backgrounds in folklore studies – such as Michael Haberlandt (1860–1940), Arthur Haberlandt (1889–1964), Rudolf Trebitsch (1876–1918), Marianne Schmidl (1890–1945), and Konrad Mautner (1880–1924) – presented their slide shows primarily at the Wiener Urania, the University of Vienna, various associations, and at the Volkskundemuseum Wien itself. After the founding of the State Office for Adult Education (Volksbildungsamt) in 1919, the slides were increasingly used in educational courses for teachers.

Between Documentation and Staging: Photographs from Galicia and Bukovina in the Photographic Collection of the Volkskundemuseum Wien (Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Folk Art)

The first catalogued object in the photo collection of the Volkskundemuseum Wien, pos/1, was taken in 1894 in Bukovina by Josef Szombathy (1853–1943). It depicts Austriaplatz in Czernowitz. Further photographs from the then Austrian crown lands – the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria and the Duchy of Bukovina – entered the collection from 1896 onwards. At the time, the photo collection was still part of the library of the Museum für österreichische Volkskunde.

The term Galicia refers to a historical region that extended across what is now southern Poland and western Ukraine. At the eastern edge of Galicia lay the smaller historical region of Bukovina, which today is part of Ukraine and Romania. The former territory of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was divided among Prussia, Russia, and Austria in three partitions (1772, 1793, and 1795) following military conflicts. The areas assigned to Habsburg rule became known as Galicia and Bukovina.

Beehive Front Boards

In the 19th century, bee houses equipped with box-shaped beehives became popular in Carniola, Carinthia, and the northwestern part of Slovenian Styria.

A distinctive feature of the beehives from this region are the painted front boards mounted on the wooden boxes, each with a small entrance hole along the lower edge. The Volkskundemuseum Wien houses more than 230 such painted boards, featuring a wide range of motifs. Religious themes, rural life, satirical scenes, as well as technological innovations and historical events are reflected in these painted depictions.

Franz Gaul and Josef Löwy – The Collectible Picture Series "Austro-Hungarian National-Costumes" (1881–1890)

The collectible picture series Austro-Hungarian National-Costumes (1881–1890) consists of 72 illustrations depicting regional costumes from various areas of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. It was produced by Franz Gaul (1837–1906), a historical painter and costume expert, and photographer Josef Löwy (1834–1902). The series was published in various formats, including leather-bound portfolios and individual images in the rarely used Carte de Boudoir format. It was aimed at the wealthier circles of society, with a single image costing the equivalent of approximately 25 euros in today’s purchasing power.

With its focus on Alpine regions, particularly Tyrol and South Tyrol (now part of Italy), the series soon became a source of inspiration for the bourgeois costume movement. The Volkskundemuseum Wien (Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Folk Art) houses 145 images related to the series, including duplicates and drafts, providing valuable insights into production processes. These holdings not only enable comparative analyses but also inspire new research questions.

Old Gmunden Faience

During the period between the museum's foundation and the end of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, the museum consistently acquired Gmunden objects. In an era of increasing industrial production, museums collected handcrafted objects in order to save them from disappearing and being forgotten. Every now and then, extensive collections from private individuals would also find their way into the museum’s collection. The majority of today's holdings of around 350 objects had already been catalogued by 1918.

Acquisition activity continued on a smaller scale from then on, with holdings from the period between 1938 and 1945 now being investigated by restitution research. Hardly any major new acquisitions were made after that, apart from some green-flamed bowls from a private collection, which were purchased in 2005.

Right From the Start – The First 1,000 Positives of the Photo Collection

The origins and early history of the photo collection are best and most impressively shown when we look at positive inventory numbers pos/1 to pos/1000 (see Hammer 2020). The photographs in this collection were acquired in the first ten years after the museum was founded, i.e. between 1895 and 1905.

Collecting these photographs was important to the museum from the very beginning. After all, photographs were seen as witnesses to a ‘disappearing’ culture as well as a medium for depicting or ‘collecting’ what was intangible or too bulky for the collections (see Haberlandt 1896), e.g. small monuments or houses.

Prinzess-Keramik

Prinzess-Keramik is the name of a company that produced ceramics in Vienna during the post-war period. In addition to utility ceramics, such as mirror frames, lamps and candlesticks, the company mainly manufactured figurines based on both secular and religious motifs. Being exported to many countries around the world, these ceramic figures used to shape the image of Austria at home and abroad.

In 2005, the Volkskundemuseum purchased a group of Prinzess-Keramik objects by a private collector couple. These objects were added to the ceramics collection and given the inventory numbers ÖMV/83123 to 83193. At the time, there was no literature on this type of ceramics and no objects were known to exist in other museums.

Österreichische Zeitschrift für Volkskunde