Bezirksamt L-Stadt Revisited (2011)
Intervention in public space, work in progress
In May 2011 I was invited to participate in the exhibition Widersprüche. Critical Agency and the Difference Within, curated by Nora Sternfeld. The show took place in Open Space, a gallery in Vienna’s 2nd district, the Jewish quarter of the city from where tens of thousands Jewish people had been expelled during the Nazi era. The curator’s concept was to invite artists and theoreticians to give a lecture at the opening on a subject related the exhibition’s title. I planned to have a talk entitled: “Talking Back! Among us and beyond us: Recognizing Anti-Semitism, disrupting Anti-Semites.”
On one of the days that I worked on preparing the lecture, I had to go to the 2nd district’s Magistratisches Bezirksamt (district administration office) in order to renew my passport. In a hallway I saw a history-revisionist information plaque displayed, which concealed the crimes committed against Jewish people in Vienna in the 1670s and between 1938 and 1945.
I decided to change my concept for the opening lecture by renaming it to “Worüber ich heute sprechen wollte und was ich morgen tun werde” (What i planned to talk about today and what i will do tomorrow). I invited the audience to join my intervention at the Bezirksamt that I announced for the following day.
On the day after the opening I went to the Bezirksamt, took down the plaque from the wall and substituted it with an artwork by the Israeli artist Menachem Lemberger, entitled “Jewish Bravery”. I dislocated the plaque and displayed it in the gallery space by contextualizing it:
“Until the 4th of May 2011, Nazi crimes had been denied and anti-Semitic history writing had been practiced in the Bezirksamt of Vienna’s L-Stadt.”
I was arrested, the plaque was immediately confiscated by the police and returned to the district administration office, where the authorities put it back on its place. After an open letter was sent (Offener Brief an die Bezirksvorstehung der L-Stadt) and a newspaper article published (NS-Verharmlosung im Bezirksamt Leopoldstadt) the lawsuit against me was abandoned and the authorities reacted by removing the plaque. Currently there are negotiations with the city administration to create a new information plaque, organize a temporary art exhibition and install a permanent artwork at the location of the former anti-Semitic manifestation.
Intervention in public space, work in progress
In May 2011 I was invited to participate in the exhibition Widersprüche. Critical Agency and the Difference Within, curated by Nora Sternfeld. The show took place in Open Space, a gallery in Vienna’s 2nd district, the Jewish quarter of the city from where tens of thousands Jewish people had been expelled during the Nazi era. The curator’s concept was to invite artists and theoreticians to give a lecture at the opening on a subject related the exhibition’s title. I planned to have a talk entitled: “Talking Back! Among us and beyond us: Recognizing Anti-Semitism, disrupting Anti-Semites.”
On one of the days that I worked on preparing the lecture, I had to go to the 2nd district’s Magistratisches Bezirksamt (district administration office) in order to renew my passport. In a hallway I saw a history-revisionist information plaque displayed, which concealed the crimes committed against Jewish people in Vienna in the 1670s and between 1938 and 1945.
I decided to change my concept for the opening lecture by renaming it to “Worüber ich heute sprechen wollte und was ich morgen tun werde” (What i planned to talk about today and what i will do tomorrow). I invited the audience to join my intervention at the Bezirksamt that I announced for the following day.
On the day after the opening I went to the Bezirksamt, took down the plaque from the wall and substituted it with an artwork by the Israeli artist Menachem Lemberger, entitled “Jewish Bravery”. I dislocated the plaque and displayed it in the gallery space by contextualizing it:
“Until the 4th of May 2011, Nazi crimes had been denied and anti-Semitic history writing had been practiced in the Bezirksamt of Vienna’s L-Stadt.”
I was arrested, the plaque was immediately confiscated by the police and returned to the district administration office, where the authorities put it back on its place. After an open letter was sent (Offener Brief an die Bezirksvorstehung der L-Stadt) and a newspaper article published (NS-Verharmlosung im Bezirksamt Leopoldstadt) the lawsuit against me was abandoned and the authorities reacted by removing the plaque. Currently there are negotiations with the city administration to create a new information plaque, organize a temporary art exhibition and install a permanent artwork at the location of the former anti-Semitic manifestation.
the section of the plaque entitled "aus der geschichte":
May 31, 2011
