Resonance & Resistance

The artistic-scientific project Resonance & Resistance: Tracing the Sound of Vienna’s Counterculture addresses music in urban space as a counter-design to social oppression and as a site of inclusive coexistence. It explores the everyday resistance of the jazz subculture of the long-haired and nonconformist Schlurfs* in Vienna during the 1930s and 1940s under National Socialist rule. Through multichannel sound experiences on bikes and augmented reality experiences in public space, their histories can be experienced in today’s Vienna and open up collective discussions of their resonance with contemporary social challenges.

The project brings the past into dialogue with contemporary Viennese music (counter)cultures through newly composed sound works by Viennese musicians, authors, and performance artists resonating with the Schlurfs* in performative collective Soundrides of Resistance across the city.

The project takes place within the framework of the project call for contemporary forms of remembrance for the Republic Jubilee Year 2025 by the Cultural Department of the City of Vienna.