Unwritten Biographies – Brüche und Kontinuitäten. Künstler*innen der Angewandten Wien. Fractures and Continuities. Artists of the Angewandte Vienna 1933–1955

By the time of the Anschluss in 1938, nothing had been left unchanged at the School of Applied Arts, now the University of Applied Arts Vienna – die Angewandte. Jewish and politically 'undesirable' teachers and students had been expelled, and countless promising careers had come to an abrupt end. Their escape routes, some spanning several continents, led to exile in the USA, England, Israel, South America, or Australia. Others, however, continued to work successfully throughout Austrofascism, the Nazi period and into the post-war years. With this anthology, die Angewandte goes in search of artists from all fields of art who have been completely forgotten or are only known to experts: Unwritten Biographies – a hitherto little-explored, decidedly ambivalent history of die Angewandte and Viennese Modernism.

With this anthology, the University of Applied Arts Vienna sets out to trace the lives and legacies of artists from the fields of fine art, architecture, stage and film design, industrial design, fashion, art education, and art therapy. These individuals include Margarete Berger-Hamerschlag, Fritz Czuczka, Bettina Bauer-Ehrlich, Richard Erdoes, Leo Glückselig, Kitty Goldman, Philipp Häusler, Fritz Janeba, Judith Katinka-Zweig, Paul Kirnig, Hans Felix Kraus, Fini Rudiger-Littlejohn, Wilhelm Müller-Hofmann, Carlo Pietzner, Ruth Rogers-Altmann, Franz Schuster, Bil Spira, Lisl Weil, Eduard Wimmer-Wisgrill, and many others. Today, they are either forgotten or only known within specialized circles: Unwritten Biographies. International researchers shed light on their lives and work and, in doing so, uncover a little-known history of both the Angewandte and Viennese Modernism.

Unwritten Biographies is the follow-up publication to "Sonderfall" Angewandte. Die Universität für angewandte Kunst Wien im Austrofaschismus, Nationalsozialismus und in der Nachkriegszeit (De Gruyter, 2024) 


Bernadette Reinhold, Collection and Archive, University of Applied Arts Vienna