Opera as a central metaphor for Austria

I am fascinated by the view of a building that the general public thinks has always looked like it did when it was reopened in 1955. It's almost like David Lynch's Lost Highway, when the film refers back to itself. In the same way, the Vienna Opera draws on itself in its aspirations and in moving forward, with a view to getting there. This has a lot to do with an Austrian identity-building process that always refers back to something that cannot be precisely named. Something that only an imagined community can actually understand, because it can sense it. For me, opera is a central metaphor for many things in Austria, including the chapter that has become so important for the Second Republic in distinguishing it from the Germans. It has to do with the fact that one thinks one can distance oneself from historical guilt, but at the same time wants to find and invent something new. This has precursors: after the alleged St. Germain dictum "L'Autriche c'est ce qui reste", the mechanisms of finding an identity began, which, however, showed numerous fractures and quickly came under pressure. Perhaps November 1955 was the zero hour 2.0. People thought: And now we are creating a new narrative once again and looking to the future.

I believe that it was important for the Austrian identity that the world looked here. The interior of the rebuilt opera expresses this. Contrary to some plans, we don't have a tiered theater, but once again the historic box theater. And the various representatives of the world are sitting in these boxes: the rich Americans, the Soviets, Shostakovich is sitting there, the British, the French - and they are all looking at us, and we are trying to infect them with our pride. But for this pride to be able to look ahead, it has to mobilize something. And what mobilizes it is culture.

There is an attempt to celebrate Vienna a little as a gift to the whole of Austria. In the sense of: Don't be so against Vienna and this water head, be proud of what the world is looking at. But the practicing of an Austrian identity runs right across the country. So: we are proud of the State Opera, but we are also proud of the Salzburg Festival, the Golden Roof, the Bregenz Festival and, and, and. In 1955, Austria discovered that culture is simply such an incredibly good engine to get out of the past - with the good and of course also with the repressive aspects.

I believe that other countries behave in the same way, of course. In my book Österreicher bist du erst in Jesolo. Eine Identitätssuche I tried to show that the Italians and Austrians have great similarities in their attempts to negotiate identity through art. In the case of Italy, it was possible to cheat a lot of things past the censorship, past a system of rule. And in our country, it was once genuinely Austrian to emphasize its identity through art in view of an emerging, new, great German empire. And that is why the State Opera, as it has looked since 1955, is so ingenious. In the color codes of the interior, the black of the Nazis was eliminated; instead, there was a return to the monarchy - gold was added, and the white became ivory. The effect is exquisite and noble, and you have to admire Erich Boltenstern, who was able to read this identity assignment, for his design. Personally, I find the 1955 opera house more beautiful than the original, all-encompassing 1869 Byzantine style that the interior exuded. This is exactly what the not unjustified criticism of the 19th century referred to: that one wanted to be everything and yet in the end did not make a statement.

The State Opera is one of the last great machines between the analog and the digital, and like a child, you can't help but be amazed. As soon as you set foot over the threshold, you not only feel this mythical sacredness, but see that the whole thing is like a giant magic box that you step into. It transforms you. And suddenly, despite all the critical distance, you have the feeling: now I'm part of it somehow.

Showing these dimensions, but also the incredible dedication of the employees - that is of course also part of the documentary. Because the enthusiasm with which everyone throughout the building took part in the film and the fact that we were made so welcome: that was impressive.

You have to be aware that, of course, not everyone went to the opera - not in the 18th, not in the 19th and not in the 20th century. But at least after 1955, opera was a bastion on which almost everyone had an opinion. Peter Marboe told the story very pointedly about a policeman who, instead of issuing a ticket to a passer-by rushing across the intersection at a red light, instead urged him on with the words: "Well, if you still want to reach Der Rosenkavalier on time, then you really must hurry now."

There is a lot of atmospheric truth in this story - and the opera house must retain this awareness. This sense of belonging puts the opera on a par with a national soccer match - with the advantage that the opera can emerge as the winner much more often than the national team. The trick now is to carry this anchoring into a new era and to overcome any fears. After all, opera must not be allowed to freeze into a compulsory tourist event.

If we live in a present in which fear and envy are so prevalent on social media, pride can also play a role as a counterbalance. I now come back to the soccer stadium, where visitors from very different social classes come together. What unites everyone is pride in the club, the team or the colors.

If this pride is honest and has something "healthy" about it, then it should be allowed to be. What's more, it's actually the engine that drives it all. I can tell you something from my family history. My grandmother once asked Marcel Prawy to help her get an opera subscription - and he actually did it. So two people with completely different biographies met and had a common interest.

And when my grandmother finally took her seat in the gallery, she felt: Thanks to this subscription, I've made it - after all the hardships. So the opera also stands for the efforts of a proud woman from an uneducated middle-class background to want to belong to something. And so I believe that pride, provided it is an honest pride, can be the moving force that allows a building like this to shine above itself.

I would put it like this: Perhaps the State Opera has a place as a central building in an Austrian sense of reality. And perhaps Austria is just as big as it is big, and is aware of its significance, its history. Perhaps Austria can accept itself to some extent in the 21st century.

I believe that our children can no longer relate to the word " inferiority" because they are simply further removed from individual historical moments - and because they are perhaps more likely to compare cities with each other than countries.

I remember the story that the former ORF General Director Gerd Bacher told to people he knew. When he rode on the roof of a coal train from the Rhineland to Salzburg in 1945 and saw the destroyed landscape, he asked himself very skeptically: "Will it ever be anything again?

So when you experienced the desolate land in 1945 and then a path became visible again in 1955, it was undoubtedly a great liberation. Perhaps you can compare it to the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, which I remember as a very big event.

But the crucial thing for us will be to carry this 1955 idea forward and explain why this date is such an important place in the history of our country. So perhaps we need to look less for comparable celebrations and more for languages of communication.

However, we hope so. Let me come back to pride: it is the story of an honest pride that can only be shown if you know and tell the whole story.
Two things were important to us: telling the truth and at the same time admiring what has been achieved with this house.
The very fact that Verdi and Wagner conducted here in the 1870s is a fantastic thought - almost like a relic in a church: somewhere, you think to yourself, their spirit is still here.
On the other hand, there is always the very latest: The Magic Flute for children - that conveys a very direct side of an enthusiasm.
It is at these hinges that the emotion springs forth - and has its effect.

So, if there's one thing you don't really have to ask yourself in Austria, it's how to celebrate.
I think the State Opera is doing it right in its own way - by going back to what's great and telling the story of what really happened.
And the wider it spreads its arms - like at the Opera Air in the Burggarten - the more people will feel connected and invited.