Providing the best possible conditions for all members of a university community while leaving behind a fair ecological footprint is a daily challenge.
Special: Sustainable mdw
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Covid-19-Report: The Covid-19 Pandemic and its Impact on Arts and Cultural Professionals
Income losses of up to 100 % and still-non-existent perspectives on how, in what form, and above all when things might be able to go forward: that’s the situation in mid-April for numerous arts and cultural professionals in Austria.
Running the University with a Fair Ecological Footprint
For two years now, the mdw has been one of the first universities in Austria to use 100 % green power—which is just one among many examples of sustainable university management set by the initiative “green mdw”.
“Support and encourage young women while they’re still studying”
Since March 2020, Vienna RSO Chief Conductor Marin Alsop has been an artist in residence at the mdw, where she’s also the first woman to teach orchestral conducting. The maestra joined Rector Ulrike Sych and Vice Rector Gerda Müller for a conversation about quotas, excellence, and equal opportunities.
One Sock Seldom Comes Alone
Well-tempered is an expression that pops up frequently in conversations with Henning Backhaus. This wouldn’t be surprising if he were a musician, but when a filmmaker uses it, it’s a good bit more noticeable.
Music
An Interview with Olga Neuwirth
Olga Neuwirth was born in Graz in 1968. She began taking trumpet lessons at age seven but had to give up playing later on due to an accident. In 1986, she went to San Francisco and enrolled at the Conservatory of Music as well as at the Academy of Art College, where she studied painting and film. She eventually transferred to the mdw.
Respect, Social Responsibility, and Top-Level Musical Experiences on Equal Terms
In 2012, an international group of instructors at the conservatory in Zaragoza, Spain joined forces with professors at that city’s university. This team set about gathering support both public and private in order to launch the project Musethica.
Alumni in Focus Special: Gisela Zdenek
On 9 July 2020, former mdw student Gisela Zdenek will be turning 100. Research in the run-up to her birthday celebration led members of her family to the mdw Archive, which in turn drew our attention to this strong-willed woman’s life history—which has always been accompanied by music. We had a birthday conversation with Zdenek about her time at the “Academy”.
Alumni in Focus: Avedis Kouyoumdjian
This year will see the International Beethoven Piano Competition Vienna held for the 16th time. Its sixth edition, which took place around 40 years ago, was won by an exceptional young musician who can now look back upon an outstanding career as a concert pianist, chamber musician, and university professor: we’re talking about the mdw’s own Avedis Kouyoumdjian.
Research
“Exposing the delimits of not-understanding”
A conversation about artistic research with South African filmmaker Jyoti Mistry.
Review: Musik und Schrift. Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven auf musikalische Notationen
Writing about writing is a paradoxical act—seeing as it involves articulating oneself using the very tool that one is attempting to describe.
The 2020 “Long Night of Research” at the mdw’s exil.arte Centre
Austrian musicologist Gerold W. Gruber is the founder and head of the mdw’s exil.arte Centre. exil.arte functions as a point of contact and interface for research on as well as the reception, preservation, and presentation of works by Austrian composers, musicians, and music researchers who were deemed “degenerate” by the Third Reich.
Drama
“Art is one of those things that brings the state to life”
Anna Marboe, born in Vienna in 1996, is a stage director and musician. She studied directing at the Max Reinhardt Seminar, from which she graduated in 2019. mdw Magazine got in touch with this versatile artist recently to talk about her artistic development and creative work.
On the Art of Playing Dead
Those who become professional actors necessarily end up developing a certain relationship with death.Romeo drinks poison and Juliet stabs herself with a dagger; Stella drinks poison and Fernando shoots himself; Woyzeck murders Marie in a fit of bloodlust with countless stabs of a knife; Ferdinand kills Luise and himself with poison...
“The Body as a Stage”: Learning from Aleksandar Acev at the Max Reinhardt Seminar
“The body already does a lot of things right on its own; the training that we do here acts as a ‘helping hand’,” says Aleksandar Acev, who’s been a professor of basic physical training and physical theatre at the Max Reinhardt Seminar since this October.
Alumni in Focus: Sarantos Georgios Zervoulakos
For the Greco-German stage director Sarantos Georgios Zervoulakos, settling on theatre was a big step.
Film
Prost Mortem – Film Academy Students Discuss their Darkly Humorous Mystery Series
Six months from the screenplay’s initial words to completion of a four-part TV series: four Film Academy Vienna students took up this challenge and produced the series Prost Mortem – Die letzte Runde.
I can be everything. I can be nothing.
The artistic research project Confronting Realities delves into the hot topic of artists’ social backgrounds while also shedding light on film production’s limitations and opportunities.
“Your body no longer realises that you’ve still got solid ground beneath your feet.”
Virtual Reality in Film: One needn’t be a tech nerd to find virtual reality fascinating.
A Day at Film Academy Vienna
Saskia Arth is working on her BA in Production. We followed her and her team through a typical day of filming work.
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