Exhibition “90 Years of the Salzburg Festival – The Great World Theatre”

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, photo: Salzburg Museum/Peter Laub, exhibition graphics: Robert Six, exhibition architecture: novakarchitects

“90 years of the Salzburg Festival”, Architectural draft by Wolfgang Novak/novakarchitects

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, exhibition graphics: Robert Six, exhibition architecture: novakarchitects

“90 years of the Salzburg Festival”, photo: Salzburg Museum/Peter Laub

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival – Everyman Ensemble”, Stefan Fahrngruber/checkpointmedia

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, installation “The Great World Theatre”, Stefan Fahrngruber/checkpointmedia

“90 years of the Salzburg Festival”, photo: Salzburg Museum/Peter Laub

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, installation “The Great World Theatre”

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, installation “The Great World Theatre”, Stefan Fahrngruber/checkpointmedia, photo: Steinmetz, Ellinger

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, installation “The Great World Theatre”, Stefan Fahrngruber/checkpointmedia, photo: levebre

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”, exhibition graphics: Robert Six, photo: Virgil Widrich

“90 Years of the Salzburg Festival – Karajan Collage”, Stefan Fahrngruber/checkpointmedia using material from the Archive of the Salzburg Festival

In 2010, the Salzburg Festival celebrated its 90th anniversary. A traditional style exhibition with panels, objects and models seemed inadequate for presenting the sheer variety of artistic brilliance. Consequently, the displays and texts were “fanned out” to reflect the scope of the Festival’s history. Soundtracks and spoken excerpts from key documents in the history of the Salzburg Festival became generators of exhibition areas, which then carried the content in the form of timber “ribs”. As a result, the history of the Salzburg Festival was physically brought into the room: visitors could not only view the events but move around in them. The timber “ribs” were connected by a timeline that traced the development of the Salzburg Festival over the decades. In this way, it was possible to present not only individual personalities and their work but also the connections to political and social events, and the ambiguities, caesuras and continuities that shaped and still shape the Festival.

The individual exhibits were placed on the surfaces of the “ribs”, thereby freeing them from the restraints of the traditional, two-dimensional form of presentation. This created “windows”, opening up views into 90 years of Salzburg Festival history. Costumes and an “Everyman” installation protruded out of the “ribs” into the surrounding space and across the visitors’ path.

The high point and grand finale of the tour was the central installation of the “World Stage” - a stylised stage with multimedia features. The media installation “The Great World Theatre” was a “meta-performance” distilled out of the leading productions of the last nine decades and reassembled into a new presentation. The stage was an abstract model, quoting and replicating all the stages and venues of the Festival, quite in the spirit of Max Reinhardt’s motto, “The city as a stage”. The projection was devised using the so-called “augmented reality” approach: the projectors were focused onto the model, capturing its form pixel by pixel. A different video could be played on each of the model’s 22 surfaces arranged on the stage area.

July 17th to October 26th, 2010 at the Salzburg Museum.

Events, worldwide.

5 events total

October 1, 201301.10.2013

Lecture at St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences – Planning an exhibition, 1.10.2013, 15:30 to 18:00. As part of the degree course in interactive media at the University of Applied Sciences in St. Pölten, Virgil Widrich explains the entire procedure from the planning stage to completion of the exhibition “The Great World Theater. 90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”. The key steps in production will be explained, including areas such as artistic direction, content and concept, project management, technology and multimedia.
January 8, 201308.01.2013

Lecture at St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences – Planning an exhibition, 08.01.2013, 13:00 to 15:30. As part of the degree course in interactive media at the University of Applied Sciences in St. Pölten, Virgil Widrich explains the entire procedure from the planning stage to completion of the exhibition “The Great World Theater. 90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”. The key steps in production will be explained, including areas such as artistic direction, content and concept, project management, technology and multimedia.
December 10, 201210.12.2012

Visual Storytelling Lecture by Virgil Widrich about the making of the exhibition “90 Years of the Salzburg Festival”. Werbe Akademie, WIFI Wien, wko campus wien, Währinger Gürtel 97, 1180 Vienna, 10.12.2012 at 18:00.
March 31, 201131.03.2011

The organised World Theatre – “90 Years of the Salzburg Festival” Lecture Virgil Widrich, FH Joanneum, Graz, “Media and interaction design” What is involved in the planning and staging of a contemporary exhibition? A look behind the scenes reveals the techniques used to produce the media, equipment and displays for the multi-dimensional Salzburg Festival exhibition created by Virgil Widrich and his team at checkpointmedia for Salzburg Museum in 2010.
January 1, 201001.01.2010
– October 26, 201026.10.2010

Virgil Widrich is appointed the artistic director of the exhibition “90 Years of the Salzburg Festival” held from 17 June to 26 October 2010 in Salzburg Museum. The centrepiece is a multimedia “meta-exhibition”, a compilation of performances from the most important productions of the last nine decades rearranged to create a programme that never actually existed in this form. The stage for this production is an abstract model that represents and reproduces the Festival venues in keeping with Max Reinhardt’s motto, “The city as a stage”.