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The Suburbanized City 1914 – today 360 GRAZ The City in all Times Dänemark Irland (Eire) Vereinigtes Königreich von Großbritannien und Nordirland Riga Lettland Kopenhagen Kārlis Ulman streich im M Europe in 1934 Litauen Antanas Smetona Kaunas Danzig London Amsterdam Niederlande Berlin Warschau Brüssel Belgien Deutsches Reich Polen Adolf Hitler Józef Piłsudski Luxemburg Paris Prag Tschechoslowakei Wolfsegg Frankreich Hallein Bern Schweiz Wörgl Bregenz Liechtenstein Innsbruck Attnang Krems Linz Enns St. Pölten Steyr Ebensee Waidhofen/Ybbs Salzburg Österreich Engelbert Dollfuß (autoritär ab 1933) Wien Korneuburg Lilienfeld Neunkirchen Eisenstadt Kindberg Gloggnitz Leoben Fohnsdorf Bruck Judenburg Lienz Voitsberg Budapest Weiz Graz Klagenfurt Ungarn Miklós Horthy Rumänien König Carol II. (Königsdiktatu Burgos Republik San Marino Monaco Belgrad Jugoslawien König Alexander I. Bukarest Andorra Portugal Italien Austria Korsika Border of the Republic of Austria (französisch) Fights in February 1934 Combat and riot zones government troops Balearen Movement of the Sardinien Benito Mussolini Antonio Salazar Madrid Lissabon Vatikanstadt Spanien Francisco Franco (Militärputsch 1936) Valencia Rom Systems of Government Democracies Dictatorships before 1920 Dictatorships as of 1920 Dictatorships as of 1933 Bulgarien Kimon Georgiew (Staatsstreich im Sofia Tirana Forms of Government Albanien Republic Monarchy Interrupted monarchy Griechenland Ioannis Metaxas (autoritär ab 1935) Gibraltar (britisch) Graz and the Europe of Dictatorships Athen After the First World War, the political order in almost all European countries Malta (britisch) democracies. By the was unstable, but first and foremost in the young mid-1930s, authoritarian fascist governments prevailed everywhere in Central Europe, with the exception of Switzerland and Czechoslovakia. Kreta Due to the Great Depression, authoritarian movements attracted the masses in Austria. The differences between them were fuzzy. E.g. parts of the Styrian Home Guards—which were originally Christian-conservative—joined the National Socialists. The Social Democrats did successful work in the cities, and also in Graz. Their leaders at federal level rather tended to wait than act: they believed that the crisis of capitalism would resolve itself. When in February 1934 the Dollfuß administration increased its pressure on the Social Democratic Party again, the party organizations, starting off from Linz, stood up against the much too powerful government troops. In Styria, the revolts concentrated in the industrial areas. Bruck an der Mur was temporarily controlled by the Social Democrats. But on February 14, the government troops conquered the last pockets of resistance in the west of Graz. 3 In the City of the Popular Uprising Some careers outlive all political upheavals. Hanns Wagula’s, who before World War II mainly worked as a poster artist, is one of them. For his filmic documentation of the Graz version of the “Anschluss”, i.e. the actual annexation of Austria in March 1938, Wagula, who sympathized with National Socialism since the late 1930s, received an award from the Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. The film forges a suggestive bridge between the poverty of the population in the Austrian “Ständestaat” (Corporative State) and Adolf Hitler’s visit in Graz on April 4, 1938, and the vote on the “Anschluss” on April 10. After the war, Wagula was mainly a filmmaker. So, for example, he made the short film “Salzburger Impressionen” (Impressions of Salzburg), which was screened in the competition of the 1956 Cannes Film Festival. Hans Haacke: Und ihr habt doch gesiegt (And You Have Won After All), 1988 Laminated photograph on aluminum © Hans Haacke The Defeated Ones in Styria In biblical revelation a woman crowned with stars appears on a half moon. The Church places this figure as a symbol of victory, et al. in the form of Marian columns, in the public space. In July 1934, SS men staged a coup against Federal Chancellor Dollfuß and acclaimed the former Governor of Styria, Anton Rintelen, the new Federal Chancellor. The putsch was put down but on July 25, 1938, Adolf Hitler gave Graz the honorary title of a “City of the Popular Uprising”. The Marian column at Eisernes Tor (Iron Gate) was sheathed in the form of an obelisk with the inscription: “And you [putschists of July] have won after all!” In the frame of the steirischer herbst festival 1988, Hans Haacke reconstructed the sign of Nazi triumph with a new inscription (in German; this is the English translation): “The defeated ones in Styria: 300 gypsies killed, 2,500 Jews killed, 8,000 political prisoners killed or deceased under arrest, 9,000 civilians killed in the war, 12,000 missing, 27,900 soldiers killed.” Right-wing extremists set the memorial on fire. The general public responded immediately with protests in front of the burnt down obelisk.—The brownshirt spirit has not won after all. 4 Hanns Wagula: Graz, Stadt der Volkserhebung, Dokumentation über den “Umbruch” 1938 in Graz (Graz, City of the Popular Uprising, documentary about the ‘radical change’ in Graz in 1938), 1938 Film (clip), length: 13:00 min GrazMuseum, ACNO 96 5 Graz in the 20th Century XII. Andritz Total population development: Wien XI. Mariatrost r Mu r fe uru uru sM te ch Re sM ke Lin XIII. Gösting III. Geidorf r fe Leechwald l rte gü Rosenhain en ari lv Ka Hilmteich X. Ries l ürte hofsg Bahn IV. Lend KF Uni Hauptbahnhof IX. Waltendorf II. St. Leonhard Ruckerlberg ger Gürtel Eggenber XIV. Eggenberg I. Innere Stadt Quayside streets: Located close to the center, these became important access roads from the north and the south and also altered the cityscape (cf. Neutorgasse). on-H ad-v Conr rtel gü rett f-St ndor ötze Laza r. VI. Jakomini Geplante Stadtautobahn durch ugürtel Schöna r Gürtel Karlaue VIII. St. Peter hn ba Ost f ho Eggenberg Triester Triestersiedlung Straße Südtirolersiedlung Köflach Budapest Social housing: This was mainly conducted on the right bank of the Mur River, e.g. along the former trade route from Vienna to Trieste (e.g. Triester Siedlung, Südtirolersiedlung). Population density: Districts I - VI Districts VII - XVII Right Bank of the Mur River VII. Liebenau XVI. Straßgang XVII. Puntigam Groß-Graz (Greater Graz) Already in the end of the 19 century, the incorporation of the surrounding communities of Graz was considered. Eventually, in 1918, the city parliament took a decision of principle pertaining this issue. A more efficient administration was hoped for; more people should profit from the industrial enterprises and the surrounding communities should enjoy a better infrastructure and higher social benefits. th But the surrounding communities feared the disadvantages of the big city and the loss of their autonomy. Not until the era of National Socialism, “Greater Graz” was realized within a few weeks. Industrial enterprises established their premises in the large undeveloped areas between the city and its new centers on the periphery. 6 Population development: TU V. Gries XV. Wetzelsdorf Beltway system: Until the Plabutsch Tunnel was built, the strained north-south route (“Gastarbeiterroute”, i.e. literally: foreign workers’ route) ran through Graz and the indoor environment quality for residents in its immediate vicinity was correspondingly low. The city expansion increased the extent and concentration of the functions of industry, trade, and traffic on the right bank of the Mur River again, as well as in the southern part of the city. Development: Previously green and little developed village structures experienced partial “devaluation” as sought-after residential and recreational areas due to development (cf. former “summer retreat” Wetzelsdorf). Housing shortage: The immigration of refugees after World War I and II led to increased demand for housing. Groß-Graz (Greater Graz): Surrounding communities with a predominantly rural peasant population most strongly rejected the incorporation. Left Bank of the Mur River The bourgeois and more attractive residential areas expanded towards the new periphery. Like the west of the city, this former surrounding area was to a great extent green space. As industry and trade had not settled down there, formerly poorer settlement areas were upgraded and became sought-for residential areas (cf. Ruckerlberg). This further increased the extent and concentration of the functions of living, recreation and education towards the east. 7 Graz today Land Use: XI. Mariatrost Development of built-up residential areas and areas of arable land in Graz XIII. Gösting Mu III. Geidorf r X. Ries IV. Lend Multi-story houses I. Innere Stadt XIV. Eggenberg IX. Waltendorf Single-family- and semidetached houses II. St. Leonhard Areas of arable land V. Gries VI. Jakomini Suburban Space: XV. Wetzelsdorf City in between: The comprehensive expansion of the city space into formerly rural areas has led to a loss of identity. The project “Lebendige historische Ortszentren” (Vibrant Historical Village Centers) is trying to reactivate the social fabric in the centers of Graz St. Peter und Graz Straßgang. VIII. St. Peter VII. Liebenau XVII. Puntigam XVI. Straßgang Single-Family-Houses: Seiersberg The “City in Between” The economic miracle brought about the disintegration of old city structures everywhere. In Graz too, the single-family-house became the dream come true for an entire generation that needed space. Graz expanded first and foremost towards the south, and the traditional inner-city suppliers such as shops, cinemas and restaurants followed to the periphery. Shopping malls increasingly took over the function of places of social encounter and the car became the essential element of this new suburban lifestyle. The historical limits between the city and the surrounding countryside became frayed and both the inner workings and the shape of the city were transformed. 8 Dense development: For affordability reasons, both building grounds and distances to the neighbors are quite small here. In the settlement areas located inter alia in the south of Graz, single-family-houses are mixed through with multi-story residential complexes and close to commercial areas. Scattered development: This settlement type is often to be found in the greenbelt in the east but also in the west of the city. What is often found here, are attractive freestanding and thus expensive real estate locations within the city area. Green Belt Shopping malls: A large number of shopping malls were built as of the 1980s. Along with good transport connections and all sorts of stores satisfying the most diverse consumer needs, the cleanliness and the security of these seemingly public spaces make them attractive. They compete with inner-city trade. Shadow of the Graz Clocktower: Created by Markus Wilfling in 2003, the year when Graz was European Capital of Culture, and featuring the contours of this landmark of Graz, it was meant to remind us of the dark sides of the city during the time of National Socialism. After 2003, the object was sold to Shoppingcity Seiersberg and since then it has served as advertising space for the shopping mall which is visible from afar. Inner-City Shopping Street 9 Graz vs Linz What if … the highway ran through the city in Graz too? Austria’s first city highway runs through Linz since the 1960s. One was planned in Graz too. Both projects have their origins in the Nazi era but Linz was significantly quicker to realize it. The city became motorized much earlier than the rest of Austria. The National Socialists expanded Linz as an industrial location, enlarged the city’s area 16-fold, and connected it to the Reichsautobahn (Reich Highway) from Vienna to Salzburg. In 1957, the construction of a rapid transit ring road was resolved to take the traffic load off the inner city and connect the industrial area. The Subtle Differences In Graz, it was planned to build the Pyhrn Highway alongside the Plabutsch Mountain through the districts of Eggenberg and Gösting. Mayor Gustav Scherbaum from the SPÖ wanted to realize this project by all means. But this was already in the 1970s. In 1973—during the first oil crisis—more than 35,000 people signed a petition against the highway. In a referendum in 1975, the Grazers declared themselves in favor of a tunnel. It was the first referendum dealing with a traffic project like this. The Plabutsch Tunnel was put into operation in 1987. After the First World War, progressive movements provided the direction first: towards welfare state, eight-hour work day, workers’ representation and women’s suffrage (in Austria as of 1919). The “new woman” of the 1920s, with a short hairstyle and fashionably dressed, was active and selfconfident. However, she could be seen much more often in film and advertising than in real life. The big city celebrated itself as the site of a new glamorous consumer culture; it became brighter, louder and faster. The divide to the people excluded from this became obvious. And critics were already congregating who regarded the city as the root of all evil. Graz: View on Eggenberg, part of the project area for the highway planned in the 1970s © Stadtvermessungsamt Graz 10 Linz: View on the meanwhile covered and greened highway in Bindermichl © 2009, StPL Linz / Pertlwieser The counter-movement already formed in the 1930s: now the countryside and its population became the model. National Socialism too glorified nature and “simple” men. Its criterion was neither social rank, nor wealth or education—it was the “racial” origin that defined everybody’s value for society. The woman shared responsibility for the “purity” of the “racial corpus”. She was pushed back into the role of housewife and mother again. The Art of Social Criticism The Fatherland Needs Mothers! Paul Schmidtbauer, a founding member of the Grazer Secession, was considered a member of the Styrian avant-garde in the 1920s and 1930s. In this time, he turned more and more to socio-critical subjects. The everyday life in the backyards and on the outskirts of cities as well as marginal people took center stage in his works. When he was in London in 1938 and considered emigration, many colleagues in Graz attacked him for this. After World War II he advocated improved working conditions for artists. Since the end of the 19th century, the Social Democrats called for universal and equal suffrage—up to that time the right to vote had depended on one’s property and tax payments. After World War I and the proclamation of the Republic of German-Austria the same right to vote for both sexes was introduced in 1918. Due to WW I more than half of the people eligible to vote were women. Right up into the 1970s, election posters addressed women first and foremost as mothers. Paul Schmidtbauer: Die Klopfstunde (The Knocking Hour), 1928 Oil on canvas Kulturamt der Stadt Graz The “Cherry Revolution” of Graz Starting out with protests of women against the high prices of foodstuffs—and particularly of cherries—of at the Kaiser-Josef-Markt, there was a riot on June 7, 1920, that lasted all day. A crowd gathered within short time, speeches were held, and eventually, market stands and warehouses were looted and destroyed. In the course of the day, the crowd moved up to Annenstraße, via Jakominiplatz and Hauptplatz. Fights with the police began, which fired at the protesters in the end. 13 people were killed. Axl Leskoschek: Kirschenrummel (Cherry Rage) 1919, 1955 Woodcut GrazMuseum, ACNO 05 / 02241 Comrade Konsum Opens in Graz Election Poster “Mütter!! denkt an eure toten Söhne” (“Mothers!! Think of your dead sons”), 1919 Paper GrazMuseum, without ACNO Between Mutterkreuz (Cross of Honor of the German Mother) and Enforced Sterilization The role of the woman as mother was at the foreground of National Socialist ideology. Women were supposed to be faithful, willing to make sacrifices and capable of suffering. “Aryan” women were encouraged to fulfill their tasks, rewarded with the “Mother’s Cross” and honored in the frame of Mother’s Day celebrations. This was contrasted by systematic abortions and sterilizations of forced women workers or women belonging to “inferior” ethnic groups. “Aryan” women faced capital punishment in case of abortions. “Das Mutterherz” (The Mother’s Heart) from “Wochensprüche der NSDAP”, 1942 Paper GrazMuseum, without ACNO At the turn from the 19th to the 20th century, there was a wave of new co-operative associations in the industrialized European countries and in the context of the growing political and unionized labor movement. These followed the model of successful British institutions. The “Großeinkaufsgesellschaft österreichischer Consumverein” (GÖC) was founded in 1905 to secure the supply of goods for the individual co-operative associations and to develop and produce own brands. Poster on the Occasion of the Opening of the GÖC Department Store, Annenstraße 22, November 27, 1926 Graphic design: Johannes Wohlfart, print: Senefelder, Graz GrazMuseum, ACNO GRA05 / 09766 12 13 The Civic Project In the first decades of the 20th century, the heyday of the urban bourgeoisie was over for the time being. It was destroyed by the First World War, which brought about the dissolution of the municipal council, special and emergency regulations, forced labor and quartering of armed forces. After the Great War, it was urgent social issues that made it more difficult to reinvigorate bourgeois politics. Refugees, returning soldiers and wounded soldiers had to be cared for, and housing shortage and starvation had to be alleviated. Nevertheless, the social democratic mayor, Vinzenz Muchitsch, managed to pursue civic and economy-related politics. A more and more radicalized society, which led straightaway into the authoritarian Corporative State—and National Socialism at a later stage—ignored the original ideals of bourgeoisie in the most brutal way. Rights were limited, and Jews and Romani people were persecuted. Differently minded citizens found “freedom” only in inner emigration and exile, or occasional resistance. Unlike in Linz, nobody speaks of “Hitlerbauten” (Hitler Buildings) in Graz. One does not recognize that the foundation pillars of these buildings were completely delusional ideas addressed against (fictional) enemies, such as “keeping clean the Germanic blood” and the annihilation of the Judaism of the world. Hitler’s hatred against the “inferior” Slavs, who must be enslaved in the new territories of the East, is not expressed in these buildings. The banality of evil is practical and livable in the Südtirolersiedlung, which was once built for those “Germans” (i.e. the South Tyroleans) who opted against Mussolini. After the end of World War II the civic project was continued under Mayor Eduard Speck. Hereby the fight against starvation and housing shortage was to the fore at first. Only after this fight was won, large-scale projects of the city could be considered. The denazification of 27,000 registered NSDAP members was a main task on the political level. “Der Jud” (The Jew) as a Scapegoat The Jews’ emancipation, which had been initiated by Joseph II among others, and their assimilation associated to this, resulted in anti-Semitism based on racial reasoning in the time of industrialization, which was to driven by Jewish manufacturers, merchants or bankers to a large extent. As shown in this poster created by the “Deutschvölkische Einigungspartei” (i.e. literally: German National Unification Party), Jews have always served as scapegoats for the socially disadvantaged, who are susceptible to anti-Semitic slogans such as “It’s the Jew’s fault!” and the reiteration of medieval delusions. Anti-Semitic election poster, around 1920 Paper GrazMuseum, without ACNO Red Graz During the time of the First Republic, Vinzenz Muchitsch (1873-1942) was the mayor of Graz and established the city as a “red island” in predominantly Christian Social Styria. His political career began in the Habsburg Monarchy. Sympathizing with anarchist movements at first, he later turned to the reformist part of social democracy. In his term as Mayor of Graz, from 1919 until he was unseated by the Dollfuß regime in 1934, he promoted communal housing and the expansion of the city’s infrastructure following the model of Vienna. Walter Seidl: Portrait bust of Vinzenz Muchitsch, 1935 Patinized plaster GrazMuseum, ACNO SKU05 / 00134 A Social Democrat Modernizes Graz from the Bottom Up In 1919, the Social Democrat Vinzenz Muchitsch was elected Mayor of Graz by the municipal council, which, for the first time, also included women. He would hold this function until 1934 and have an essential impact on the city of Graz during his term. The expansion of the city’s infrastructure and social housing were among Muchitsch’s major concerns. To fund this, the city took out loans, among them one with a US bank in the amount of 2.5 million dollars. Most of this amount was invested in the expansion of the waterborne sewage system, which thus replaced the old system of collecting human excrements in metal garbage cans and carting these away when they were full (Heidelberger Tonnensystem) once and for all. Election poster of the Social Democratic Party, 1929 Paper Graz, Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, ACNO Plakat Slg Politik 1929 Nr. 19 Vote Catching with Rustic Ideas Soon after its foundation, the Christian-Socialist Party was accused before Pope Leo of muddling ideas, antiSemitism and lack of knowledge of Catholic doctrines. After the death of its leader, Karl Lueger, in 1910, the party headed towards its decline due to its orientation towards the rural population. Its answer to the social issue consisted of an anti-capitalism which—at first, in the frame of a party democracy—was opposed by an economic reform based on the backward ideal of a corporative social order. Election poster of the Christian Social Party, 1929 Paper Graz, Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, ACNO Plakat Slg Politik 1929 Nr. 3 16 17 The Seemingly Harmless Beginnings Social and national issues only apparently take center stage in this excerpt from the NSDAP party program of 1920. At a closer reading it becomes clear that the claims of these two items on the agenda address the Jews. What they contained was the Jews’ exclusion from the “Volksgenossenschaft” (i.e. the national community): they should be deprived of all their civil rights and their professional means of existence. In Graz, the flyer was distributed by the “Vaterländischer Schutzbund” (Protectors of the Fatherland), Graz chapter, with the martial name “Sturmabteilung Rossbach”. Party program of the NSDAP – Ortsgruppe (chapter) Graz, 1920 Flyer “recycled history” – Joachim Hainzl Collection City of the Popular Uprising In February 1938, Federal Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg granted an amnesty and freedom of activity to the Austrian National Socialists on the Obersalzberg. Subsequently, protests of the brownshirt masses started in Graz, which led to the honorary title of “City of the Popular Uprising” at a later stage. Seen from the perspective of international law, Adolf Hitler knew that he could not afford the annexation of Austria as he had to take the military intervention of Great Britain into account. It was the mass demonstrations in Graz and Innsbruck in March 1938 that encouraged him to risk the annexation. That Adolf Hitler was made honorary citizen of Graz in the following year already got lost in the plethora of similar honorary titles across the entire Third Reich. Graz receiving the honorary title “City of the Popular Uprising”, 1938 Letter from the Reich Chancellery GrazMuseum, without ACNO 18 The crisis-ridden Interwar period produced a modernity bound by tradition in the architecture of Graz. Despite all rejection of historicism local values were in the fore in the new building attitude. All the more, the geometrical rationalism of the gas, electricity and water plants planned by Rambald von Steinbüchel-Rheinwall stand out from the harmoniously contradictory overall picture of the early 1930s. They were a symbol of “cold internationalism” which the Home Guard had always warned against. One’s Own and the Alien Noble Appearances and Sexual Reality In this series of linocuts, Alwine Hotter depicts in a provocative manner how the patriarchal bourgeois society dealt with sexuality and gender relations. The episodes she presents here circle around the idea that the ‘tact’ of the noble ladies and gentlemen is only about keeping up appearances while they are in truth also driven by their instincts. After its presentation in 1921, the work was censored and banned. Alwine Hotter: Liebesleben der feinen Gesellschaft (The Sex Life of the High Society), 1921 Series of linocuts Privately owned, Graz Gloomy Presentiments Territorial reorganization after the Great War further radicalized the conservative national segments not only in the neighboring province of Carinthia. Members of the Styrian Home Guard units were recruited in part from among Carinthian and Styrian “defense fighters” against the Slovenes. Around 1930, these groups were clearly oriented towards fascism. Fascist movements emerged in many European countries after the First World War. This attitude, which has been latent in society up to the present day, was in the majority everywhere at the time. The fascist body of thought is the expression of uncritical identification with one’s own group and aggressive violence against the “others”. These “others” were Jews, homosexuals and all people who were perceived as belonging to a different race such as Romani people. Styria played a pioneering role in the enforcement of the Nazi body of thought. The NSDAP Austria was founded by a splinter group of the Styrian Home Guard. In 1938, at the voting on the so-called “Anschluss” tens of thousands of people who were persecuted by the regime were excluded from voting. The mayor of Graz at the time, SS Obersturmbannführer Julius Kaspar, declared the “Gau capital” “free of Jews” already in March 1940. Ida Maly earned a living as a portrait painter. After she gave birth to her daughter she entered a state of severe financial and mental crisis and, eventually, she had to put her daughter up for adoption. In 1928, she was committed to the psychiatric hospital in Graz, then in Vienna. What she dealt with in her works was among other things her own break with socially determined role stereotypes. In 1941, she was murdered in the frame of the Nazi euthanasia program in the extermination center Hartheim near Linz. Ida Sofia Maly: Trübe Ahnungen (Gloomy Presentiments), Self Portrait, 1928 Watercolor and ink on tracing paper Privately owned, Graz Austria Wants back to the Reich The desire in Austria to become part of the German Empire dates back to 1871, the year the German Empire was created, when the German-speaking population of the Habsburg Monarchy suddenly turned into a minority. The separation of Lower Styria as a consequence of the Habsburg Monarchy’s defeat in the Great War further increased these tendencies. The poster’s creator, Hermann Bergmeister from Vorarlberg, was a painter, graphic designer and illustrator and, among other things, worked in Graz as an art teacher in the early 20th century. Hermann Bergmeister: Ein Volk – ein Reich (One People—One Empire), 1925 Paper GrazMuseum, ACNO GRA05 / 08864 21 Cinema Advertising in Still Image Lost Jewishness in the Streets of Graz In 1910, Anton Ramisch opened his “Kunstgewerbliche Malerei” in Glacisstraße 69 and the associated workshop in Burggasse 4. He learned the crockery wholesale trade in his father’s business but he was mainly interested in glass and porcelain painting. Along with hand-painted crockery, Ramisch also produced socalled “cinema slides”, middle-format advertising slides to be used in cinemas. He became internationally acclaimed for his photographs on glass and porcelain. To drive out Jewish competitors from local business has always been one of the main objectives of Austrian antiSemitism throughout history. Already soon after 1867, when Jews were allowed to freely move and do business again in the Habsburg Monarchy, the first calls for the boycott of Jewish shops were to be heard. Yet it was left to Adolf Hitler’s National Socialist movement to turn this anti-Semitism into the systematic genocide of at least 6 million Jews. Original sketch for the poster “Kunstgewerbliche Malerei Anton Ramisch” Painted paper Gschier Collection List of Jewish shops in Graz from Grazer Nachrichten, March 23, 1929 Cover page (reproduction, original: 22.5 x 14.6 cm) Graz, Steiermärkische Landesbibliothek Escaped from Nazi Terror The photo albums belonged to Daisy Bene-Kastner, granddaughter of company founder Carl Kastner and his wife Julia Öhler, and heiress of a part of the Kastner & Öhler department store. In several albums she tells her relatives the history of the secret “landmark of Graz” and her family. Daisy Bene, a “half Jew” in the diction of the time, was lucky. She escaped the Nazi annihilation machinery by a hair’s breadth. That a bomb hit the SS Race and Settlement Office spared her the fate of her uncle, Franz Öhler, who died in the Buchenwald concentration camp in 1945. The department store and the Kastner & Öhler family Photo on cardboard / Daisy Bene Collection The Jewish Cemetery is Burning In the so-called “Reichskristallnacht” (referred to in English as Crystal Night or Night of the Broken Glass) in November 1938, the synagogue on the Grieskai burst into flames like many other temples all over the Third Reich. The fires were started by the Nazis. The Jewish ceremonial hall in Wetzelsdorf met the same fate.—In 1934, the Jewish Community had 1,720 members. Due to Nazi terror more than 400 Jewish Grazers emigrated to Palestine alone until November 1938. Those who stayed in Graz had to move to Vienna, from where they were deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp at a later time. Alfred Steffen Collection: Fire at the ceremonial hall of the Jewish cemetery in the Alte Poststraße (historic post road) / Wetzelsdorferstraße, 1938 Photograph (reproduction, original: 10 x 15 cm) Graz, Multimedia Collections, Universalmuseum Joanneum, ACNO: RF54325 22 23 The Shape of the City Around 1900, the development of the inner districts of Graz was largely completed. It was the housing shortage after the First World War that gave city development new momentum. The municipality provided new housing and founded housing estates—such as the one in Triester Straße—and provided municipal building grounds on the eastern outskirts. Yet the great urban development project of the 1920s and 1930s was the incorporation of the surrounding communities. Above all, Mayor Muchitsch promoted the project. But he did not manage to prevail against the communities’ resistance and the conservative wing of the municipal council. But the authoritarian Nazi regime realized “Greater Graz” within only a few weeks. This hand grenade throwing range on the target practice grounds of the Feliferhof has inscribed itself in many people’s memory as a silent symbol of political crime. Far more than 300 people were executed here for “Wehrkraftzersetzung” (“subversion of the war effort” is one of the common translations), political resistance, and other reasons. In May 1945, a mass grave was opened where 142 bodies were found. Subsequently, they were buried with dignity at the central cemetery of Graz. In the frame of an annual mourning ceremony there, all victims of Nazi terror are commemorated. According to the ideas of the National Socialists, the “City of the Popular Uprising” was to become a National Socialist model city. Parts of the inner city of Graz were to be razed and replaced by gigantic boulevards, solemn squares and stunning monumental buildings. In the end, Graz was spared this assault on its appearance—not least due to successful filibustering. Yet it was not spared the air raids of the Allied Forces from late winter 1944 to Easter 1945. Almost 50 % of the city’s buildings were destroyed or damaged by them. Plan of the “Fuhrer City” of Graz Topography of Destruction On February 17, 1939, the Fuhrer declared by order that Graz was one of those cities whose expansion would enjoy particular support by the Reich. Upon the recommendation of Albert Speer, Peter Koller was entrusted with the planning for Graz. The intervention into the cityscape of Graz would have been massive: road axes up to 75 meters wide would have been built in the west and south; train stations would have been relocated; and vast squares with monumental buildings were planned. In the vicinity of the Jakominiplatz alone, 100 houses would have been demolished. Air warfare began in 1939, when Nazi Germany attacked Warsaw, and culminated in the Battle of Britain. Unlike in previous wars, the population of Graz experienced the war events at home for the first time in World War II. Because Hitler’s unconditional surrender was delayed, the Allied forces also conducted air raids on Graz in 1944 and 1945. Almost 50 % of all buildings were damaged, and many completely destroyed. That “only” about 3,000 people were killed is mainly due to the systems of tunnels under the Schloßberg. Plan of the main streets and inner city areas and the locations of the new administration buildings, 1939-1940 Planned by: Arch. Dipl.Ing. Peter Koller Berlin GrazMuseum, without ACNO Aerial view of Graz after the air raid by the Allied Forces, April 1945 Photograph (reproduction, original: 20 x 20 cm) Magistratsdirektion Sicherheitsmanagement The Dream of Rural Graz On the occasion of the celebrations for Peter Rosegger’s 100th birthday, Wilhelm Kadletz, a politician from Leoben and head of the Upper Styrian branch of the “Kameradschaft steirischer Künstler und Kunstfreunde” (i.e. an association of Styrian artists and art lovers in the Nazi era) opened the exhibition “Steirische Städtebilder” (Styrian City Views) in Leoben in 1943. It showed 24 city views of the Gau of Styria. This painting too, which shows Graz with sparsely populated agrarian surroundings, formed part of the National Socialist cultural project. The mountains of the Grazer Bergland including the Schöckl are towering in the background. Paul Schmidtbauer: Graz from the South, from the series “Styrian City Views”, around 1943 Oil on canvas MuseumsCenter Leoben 26 27 Due to environmental protection considerations, the GrazMuseum also offers this folder for download as a PDF document at www.grazmuseum.at. www.grazmuseum.at