Remembering Controversial People. The Potential of the Museum in the Debate about Karl Lueger

Based on the question of who should be remembered in the public (urban) space and how, the long-running debate about memorials to the anti-Semite and former mayor of Vienna Karl Lueger gained new momentum in 2020. In particular, the Lueger memorial in Vienna’s city center, erected in 1926 (and controversial ever since), became the subject of criticism. In this article, we trace the history of the debates surrounding Lueger’s commemoration in Vienna’s urban space and ask what a critical and reflective culture of remembrance regarding problematic individuals might look like. Therefore, we present the museum – which has so far been largely ignored in the debate – as a suitable space for discourses of remembrance about monuments. We discuss both the benefits and the potential pitfalls of a musealization of the Lueger monument and present the intervention Achtung, Personenkult! (Caution, cult of personality!) in the Bezirksmuseum Wieden as a practical example of a critically positioned and multi-perspectival remembrance of Karl Lueger in the museum.