Capital of Culture Show

Photographic “journey through time” from yesterday to today

Celebrations to mark the 80th birthday of Emperor Franz Josef in Bad Ischl

(Bild: Sammlung Hubmann / brandstaetter images / picturedesk.com)

Photographic art past and present: a new exhibition in Grundlsee invites you on a "journey through time" through the Salzkammergut. Contemporary photographers reinterpret old photos of the region. The show is part of the Capital of Culture 2024 program.

A picture is said to be worth a thousand words. The picture that Styrian photographer Michael Moser took of Hallstatt around 1885 says a lot: It shows a remote place in the middle of the Alps, where life must have been hard at the time. But it also shows a picturesque landscape that was just about to become a magnet for visitors.

A good 150 years later, Hallstatt has long since become a symbol of mass tourism - the place is so well known that there is even a copy in China, of which Zhang Kechun took an iconic photo. These two photos are currently hanging next to each other in the sports hall of the Zloam vacation village in Grundlsee - as part of the "Time Travel" exhibition, which curator Yvonne Oswald has put together as part of the Salzkammergut 2024 Capital of Culture.

"I wanted to facilitate a dialog between yesterday and today," says Oswald. To do this, she delved into the archives of the Salzkammergut, unearthed photos that tell special stories about the region and then gave these images to contemporary photographers as inspiration for new photographic works: "On the one hand, I wanted to bring old photographic treasures from the region to the fore. On the other hand, the scenes depicted in them should be commented on with a contemporary view - also critically," says Oswald.

Photographic "journey through time" between yesterday and today
So what do these photographic encounters look like? Polish photographer Pawel Jaszczuk, for example, followed in the footsteps of photographer Hans Gielge, who documented folk festivals in Ausseerland in the 1920s and 30s, to the Ausseer Kirtag. In contrast to the historical original, Jaszczuk not only makes fun and folk culture visible, but also the effects of alcohol and flirting.

Once: folk music with violins after 1936

(Bild: Kammerhofermuseum Bad Aussee)

And today: Pawel Jasczcuk - untitled

(Bild: Pawel Jasvzuk)

"Such pictures would hardly have been possible in the past because photos were very expensive and people only wanted to capture what was supposedly representative," says Oswald.

Social changes
Very often, the pairs of pictures tell of such social changes: Viennese photographer Stefanie Mooshammer, for example, reacts to a picture of a Flinserl parade in Aussee in the 1950s with a modern everyday scene in which two Flinserl stand in the kitchen and take care of the household. Swiss photographer Patrick Lambertz set out in search of the once glamorous lido in Gmunden - and found a dreary vacancy. And Slovakian photographer Zuzana Pistaiova devoted herself to the imperial cult in Bad Ischl. Her response to a photo of the celebrations surrounding Emperor Franz Joseph's 80th birthday in 1910: all that remains of the glitz and glamor is commerce and a costume party.

However, many of the pictures also have a conciliatory note: in her own pictures of rock formations on the Dachstein, for example, with which she reacts to photos by alpine legend Friedrich Simony, Oswald shows that although the change in the landscape is sometimes drastic, at the same time much remains the same. And Japanese artist Yukimi Akiba takes a touching look at photos by Michael Moser, in which he portrayed people from the Salzkammergut region who were about to emigrate or go to war at the beginning of the 20th century. She has embroidered these photos with a filigree sea of flowers that looks like a contemporary embrace for their historical courage.

Curator Yvonne Oswald in the show in Grundlsee

(Bild: Christoph Hartner)

"Despite all the differences between then and now, it is also important to me to show how great the coexistence of past and present is," says Oswald. The exhibition will be on display in Grundlsee until August 20 and will then move to the Museum of History in Graz in 2025.