Texts by
Werner Kaligofsky, Herta Wolf and Barbara Schröder
Designed by the artist
21.2 × 28.2, 124 pages, 84 duplex and 7 b/w illustrations
Softcover with dust jacket, German/English
Cologne: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, 1998
ISBN 3-88375-352-1
This artist’s book represents a long-term project by Werner Kaligofsky, in which he accompanied the demolition of the former Habig hat factory in Vienna and the construction of the Generali Foundation there from 1991 to 1995.
Kaligofsky explores this transformation process from an industrial building into an art museum in his photographs, which are accompanied by historical and sociological research on several levels. Firstly, there is the (vanished) industrial history of the Habig hat factory from the Austrian K&K monarchy, which manifests itself on the one hand in its Viennese production hall, the street-side salesroom and the industrialist’s villa with adjoining garden, including the urban development effects of its construction in the district. On the other hand, the changing historical production processes with pre-production in the low-wage countries of the time, which became obsolete with the decline of the monarchy, become clear. The modern man without a hat, as propagated by Adolf Loos on his return from the USA, and the Lumière brothers’ film “Workers Leaving the Factory” become the motif for the subsequent use of the former hat factory as a contemporary art center. The historic brick construction with a shed roof supported by cast-iron columns and glass panels is replaced by a contemporary architecture of exposed concrete and steel with skylights made of stretched plastic foil.
During the five-year construction period, Kaligofsky was on site several times a week and chose “a few, remote angles” for his photographs. He positioned and set the camera so “that the section in the viewfinder would be identical with the print”. He also refrained from using other photographic techniques such as unusual perspectives and the like. Overall, he practiced an “emancipated” photography that did not give preference to one object over another and neither avoided nor focused on the construction site workers, let alone aestheticized them.
In his photo book, Kaligofsky publishes 80 of a total of 400 photographs, which he enriches with his research and a photo-historical essay by Herta Wolf as well as a socio-historical text by Barbara Schröder. Kaligofsky understand his project “Labor Disappears in the Product” as a photo essay that captures a longer process and constructs a chronology by juxtaposing individual images.
Sabine Breitwieser