Medical history exhibition
The era of National Socialism marks the historic nadir of Austrian medicine. To mark the 80th anniversary of the end of Austria’s sovereignty, the Nazi seizure of power and its consequences, the Josephinum shows the impacts of these events on the Viennese Medical Faculty. The exhibition is about the pre-history of antisemitism and racism before the Nazi era, the direct effects of the events of March 1938, the expulsion of a large section of the faculty staff and the career benefits enjoyed as a consequence by Nazi Party-members. It also deals with the ideological takeover of the faculty by the Nazi doctrine of “racial hygiene”, the research practices that included criminal experiments on humans, forced sterilization and participation in the “euthanasia” program against psychiatric patients, as well as the increasing militarization of teaching and research over the course of the war. Further key points are the year 1945 as an ambivalent caesura, early attempts to confront the Nazi past and, not least, the Josephinum’s position as a center of medical history in Austria.
This exhibition was dedicated to all members of the Medical Faculty who suffered injustice, violence and cruelty at the hands of the National Socialists.
Exhibition dates: Mar 14th - Dec 29th 2018
Curators: Herwig Czech & Niko Wahl
