Contributions to a History of Photography in Austria, volume 20

Edited by Monika Faber for Photoinstitut Bonartes, Vienna, and Walter Moser for the Photographic Collection of the Albertina, Vienna

In the 1890s, Father Lambert Karner of the Göttweig Benedictine abbey in Lower Austria began exploring caves dating back to the Middle Ages. Emil Wrbata, a graduate of the Vienna Graphische Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt [Graphic Arts College], took his camera and state-of-the-art flash equipment along as he accompanied him into the dark and extremely narrow corridors of these Erdstall tunnels (earthen stables). The subsequent lectures featuring ‘full-size’ slide projections enthralled their audiences; a lavish volume with photographs and scientific texts was published for the community of experts, prompting further studies of the mystery of the Erdstall tunnels, which remains unsolved to this very day. With his experience of artificial lighting in difficult conditions, Wrbata was ideally suited for taking photographs at crime scenes. Indeed, he went on to become the first director of the Police Headquarters’ own in-house photo studio in Vienna, founded in 1898.

Hanna Schneck is a scientific librarian for the Photoinstitut Bonartes; in 2017 she also became a member of the museum library staff at the Albertina.