One of the latest events in Europe to be the target of accusations of anti-Semitism, the Vienna Festival kicks off on Friday, with its new director, Milo Rau, calling for cultural venues to be kept free from the “antagonism” of Israel-Hamas. war and at the same time face difficult issues.
Given that the conflict in Gaza strongly polarizes opinions, “we must be inflexible” in defending the free exchange of ideas and opinions, the acclaimed Swiss director told AFP in an interview this week.
“I’m not going to take a step aside… If we let the antagonism of war and our society infiltrate our cultural and academic institutions, we will have lost completely,” said the 47-year-old, who will inaugurate the Wiener Festwochen, festival of theater, concerts, opera, cinema and lectures that runs until June 23 in the Austrian capital and which took a more political turn during his mandate.
The Swiss director has become known as a provocateur, whether traveling to Moscow to stage a reenactment of the trial of Russian protest punk band Pussy Riot, using children to act out the story of notorious Belgian pedophile Marc Dutroux, or trying to recruit Islamic State Jihadists as actors.
– ‘Completely ridiculous’ –
The Vienna Festival angered Austria’s conservative government – which is close to Israel – by inviting former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis and French Nobel Prize winner for literature Annie Ernaux, both considered too critical of Israel.
A pre-festival speech at Judenplatz (Jewish Square) by German-Israeli philosopher Omri Boehm – who called for the replacement of Israel with a binational state for Arabs and Jews – also made waves.
“Who will be left to invite? Every day there are about ten articles accusing us of being anti-Semitic, saying that our flag looks like the Palestinian flag, completely ridiculous things,” said Rau, while working on a giant bed that was specially designed by art students and installed at the festival secretariat.
Hamas’ bloody October 7 attack on southern Israel and the devastating Israeli response fueled existing resentment regarding the conflict in the Middle East between two diametrically opposed camps in Europe.
In this climate, “listening to the other side is already a betrayal”, lamented the artistic director.
“Wars begin with this impossibility of listening and I find it sad that we Europeans are repeating war at our level,” he said.
As head of the NTGent theater in the Belgian city of Ghent, he adds that his time currently “is divided between a pro-Palestine country and a pro-Israel country”, or between “colonial guilt” in Belgium and “genocide guilt”. ” in Austria, the birthplace of Adolf Hitler.
– ‘Institutional revolution’ –
The “Free Republic of Vienna” will be proclaimed on Friday during this year’s Vienna Festival celebration. according to Rau, “a second modernism, democratic, open to the world” in the city of the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, and the artist and symbolist master Gustav Klimt.
Around 50,000 people are expected to attend the opening ceremony in the square in front of Vienna’s majestic neo-Gothic Town Hall.
With Rau describing it as an “institutional revolution” and unlike any other festival in Europe, the republic has its own anthem, its own flag and a council made up of Viennese citizens as well as honorary members including Varoufakis and Ernaux, who will participate virtually in the debates.
The republic will also have spectacular trials – with the participation of real lawyers, judges and politicians – over three weekends.
Although there is no verdict, Rau himself will be in the dock for embodying “the elitist artistic system”, followed by the Republic of Austria and, finally, the anti-immigrant far-right Freedom Party (FPOe), which leads the polls. in the Alpine EU member ahead of national elections in September.
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