The Shores of Austria

The new collection on view of theAustrian Museum of Folk Life and Folk Art

By Yarden Daher, Alexander Martos,Negin Rezaie, Ramin Siawash, Niko Wahl,Sama Yasseen, Reza Zobeidi

As a particular variety of cultural studies, ethnology and the study offolklore display a broad spectrum when it comes to exploring and docu-menting the population of a country and their material culture. In doingso, they also define who is on the inside and who is not: He, who is over-looked by research, does not show up. Up until now, this was the casewith us, but now we have changed things. We speak Arabic, Dari, Farsi,Pashtu, and English, some of us even German. We are gay, straight andtrans. We are architects, journalists, artists, and curators. Here and now,we do show

up.

As part of the project" Museum on the Run", an in- depth discussion onthe topics of flight, migration, and arrival has been taking place since2017 at the Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Folk Art via its activities inresearch, collections, exhibitions, and intermediation. Within the scopeof a fellowship program for highly qualified asylum seekers, five refuge-es in cooperation with two curators set up a collection of materials thatwas acquired by the museum. During the Viennese festival" Wienwoche2018", it entered the permanent exhibition in excerpts

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