Design Dialogue: Jews, Culture and Viennese Modernism

Design Dialog: Juden, Kultur und Wiener Moderne

The Design Dialogue anthology is a remarkable exploration of the decisive role of Jewish patrons, professionals, architects, designers and authors in shaping modern Viennese architecture, design, and material culture.

Leading cultural historians, museum curators, art historians, and architects present cutting edge research examining how famous and less known protagonists created new cultural languages, identifications and networks, engaged in social debates, and contributed to the cultural renewal of Vienna, a major capital in Central Europe, between 1800 and 1938.

Elana Shapira is Senior Post-Doctorate Researcher and Project Leader of the Austrian Science Fund research project »Visionary Vienna: Design and Society 1918-1934« and lecturer in Design History and Theory at the University of Applied Arts Vienna. Her book Style and Seduction: Jewish Patrons and Modern Architecture and Design in Fin de Siècle Vienna was published in 2016, and her coedited book Émigré Cultures in Design and Architecture was published in 2017.