Ramesch Daha WIEN 1933 – 1935

Ramesch Daha (b. 1971, Tehran, Iran) has developed a new work for Kunsthalle Wien’s vitrine: WIEN 1933 – 1935 (2026). For this piece, the space functions as a lightbox for an extensive work that focuses on the Februarkämpfe [February Uprisings], the uprisings that took place in Vienna in February 1934. The violent clashes between factions of the ‘Republikanischer Schutzbund’, the banned paramilitary arm of the Austrian Social Democratic Workers’ Party, and the authoritarian right-wing government of Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, marked a decisive moment in Austria’s political history, weakening resistance to the subsequent rise of National Socialism.

Daha’s practice investigates marginalised or overlooked historical narratives, often drawing on archival material such as maps, official documents and personal testimonies. In this work, she incorporates diary entries from Fritz Habeck, a 17-year-old resident of the Karl-Marx-Hof – one of the main centres of the Februarkämpfe – and the future chancellor Bruno Kreisky, alongside newspaper articles, maps and official records from the years 1933 to 1935. Each document is traced by hand onto paper, a physical gesture intended to confront history and consciously reckon with the past. The drawings are subsequently scanned, tinted and transferred to transparent film to make the images for the lightbox.

The work challenges conventional historical narratives, highlighting what is typically excluded or forgotten and emphasising the human story behind abstract data. Through this approach, events are rendered visible as both historical fact and lived experience, continuing Daha’s engagement with memory, documentation and the translation of archival material into contemporary art.