Film Music and Ideological Mediation of Wien-Film 1938–1945. Veils over Their Eyes and Ears
The Wien-Film was one of the largest film studios of National Socialism. Since the company’s focus was mainly on films with apolitical character, it held a unique position that distinguished it from the rest of the film industry in the »Third Reich«. Despite its apparent focus on lighthearted entertainment, the company disseminated tangible, albeit subtle messages to its audiences. Arguably, its features were imbued with ideology in a way that was more efficient through concealing or avoiding the common tropes of National-Socialist propaganda. Focusing on film music in the National-Socialist film industry and growing out of the FWF-funded project »The Wien-Film. A Comprehensive Analysis of the Film Studio 1938–1945« (Prinpical Investigator: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Stefan Schmidl, 2018–2021) the project’s aim is to trace the workflow of the compositions and applied manipulation strategies. The productions of Wien-Film are analyzed and contextualized from a musicological perspective.
Timur Sijaric was born in Sarajevo (SFRY) in 1990. He studied classical saxophone and composition at Music and Arts University of the City of Vienna (MUK) and musicology at University of Vienna. Since 2020, he pursues a PhD at University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna (mdw). From 2016 to 2017, he was Research Assistant at the Institute for Science and Research at MUK. As of February 2018, 2018–2021 he was Research Assistant at the Musicology Department (formerly Institute for Art and Music History Research of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, now ACDH-CH): »The Wien-Film. A Comprehensive Analysis of the Film Studio 1938–1945«, Prinpical Investigator: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Stefan Schmidl. From 2020 to 2021 Sijaric was project leader of »Wien im Kulturfilm. Aspekte der audiovisuellen Inszenierung der Stadt 1938–1958«. Since 2020, he is Project Research Assistant at various projects at MUK. Timur Sijaric collaborates with other research projects on historical film music, audiovisuality, and the mediality of music.
»Angeeigneter Mythos, ideologisierte Geschichte. Rembrandt van Rijn und sein medialer ›Geniekult‹«, in: Hans-Michael Bock, Jan Distelmeyer und Jörg Schöning (Hg.), Grenzüberschreitende Licht-Spiele. Deutsch-Niederländische Filmbeziehungen (CineGraph Buch 31), München 2021 (in Vorbereitung); gem. mit Stefan Schmidl (Hg.), Franz Grothe: Die Frau meiner Träume (= Filmmusik in historisch-kritischen Editionen Band 1), Wien, Filmarchiv Austria 2021; gem. mit Stefan Schmidl, »Subversive Obedience. The Film Music of Willi Forst’s Viennese Trilogy«, in: Studia Musicologica Labacensia (Bd. 5), 2021, Laibach, S. 127–143.
Als Folge des »Anschlusses« Österreichs 1938 war die nationalsozialistische Wahrnehmung der »Ostmark« ambivalent und spiegelt sich in der Gründung und Mission des Wien-Film-Konzerns wider. Ähnlich wie bei anderen Kunstvereinen entstand die Wien-Film durch eine Zwangsvereinigung nahezu aller bestehenden österreichischen Filmproduktionsfirmen.