InFORM 02.2008 (PDF-File) - Duktus

Places and people
1
C u l t u r a l s p l e n d o u r s a n d a g r e a t q u a l i t y o f l i f e
„In Vienna everything was wonderful. Lots
of money and luxury galore.“ Despite what
he called the „Empress‘s sanctimoniousness“,
Giacomo Casanova certainly found
exactly what he liked in Vienna. Yet this
gossipy summing-up of the town that he
gives in his „Memoirs“ is still no more than a
snapshot from the 18th century. There other
conditions too that Vienna experienced.
He was not wrong though. As capital of the
Holy Roman Empire, and particularly under
the regency of the Habsburg emperor,
Vienna became one of the most important
cities in the world, and had an enormous
economic, political and especially cultural
influence. Above all in architecture and music,
for a long time it was Vienna that set the
style – one has only to think of names like
Haydn, Mozart, Johann Strauss the elder
and younger right through to Schönberg.
Innumerable concerts show that even today
Vienna is still one of the world‘s capitals
of music. As well as the music of the Vienna
classical period, the architectural and artistic
works of the Vienna Secession of the
years around 1900 are some of the enduring
witnesses of the city‘s more recent history.
With its .1 million inhabitants, Vienna
was the fourth largest city in the world at
that time. Today the number is about 1.6
million. For the ten million or so tourists
that the city welcomed in 007, it was impossible
to appreciate more than a fraction
of all these cultural achievements. Among
the most popular sights are the Stephans-
The cultural attractions of Vienna are overwhelming
dom (St. Stephen‘s Cathedral), the Schönbrunn
Palace and Zoo, the Kunsthistorisches
Museum, the Hofburg and of course the
Great Wheel on the Prater. The city centre,
with its magnificent buildings along the
Ringstrasse, is designated part of the world
cultural heritage.
What Vienna has a reputation for above
all is a high quality of life. There are many
easy-going coffee houses where one can sit
for hours with one‘s coffee with milk and
read the paper without being bothered by
the waiters. The Heurigen too – the bestknown
of these little wine-drinking locales
can be found in Grinzing − bear witness
to a more relaxed way of life. The Vien-
nese are also said to have an intimate acquaintanceship
with the transitory nature
of things. The author Milo Dor explained
it like this: „People just don‘t take themselves
too seriously here. Of course there
are people who try to play an important
role but everyone knows that it is just playacting.“
In no sense is Vienna just living off its past
splendours. The city is prospering both culturally
and economically. Vienna is the fifth
most wealthy region in the EU. Companies
see Vienna as a springboard to the East.
Particularly in anticipation of the eastward
expansion of the EU, many major foreign
companies made Vienna the hub of their
activities in the countries of central and
eastern Europe or founded a new centre
there to embark on their expansion into
these markets. There are many prestigious
international organisations that have their
headquarters in Vienna. With 147 international
conferences and congresses in 006,
Vienna was the world‘s favourite city for
events of this kind ahead of Paris and Singapore.
One well known conference is for example
the IWA World Water Conference,
which is being held there from the 8th to
the 1 th of September 008. It will be the
big questions of climate change, population
growth and the supply of water that will
be considered there. Tiroler Röhren- und
Metallwerke too will be present and showing
its commitment there (see the article
on page 1 ).