An article by CRAACE Research Fellow Julia Secklehner, ‘Eine andere Moderne? Neue Frauen am Land in the 1930er Jahren,’ has been published in the journal zeitgeschichte.

The essay analyses the staging of the popular visual ideal of the New Woman in an alpine setting and her function as part of Austria’s rural modernity of the 1920s and 30s. It pays particular attention to photograph and (fashion) illustration in the magazines ‘Die Bühne’ and ‘Moderne Welt,’ and contributions by young female artists. Their work shows that rural culture and tradition, which became a central aspect of Austrian state ideology in the 1930s, cannot simply be summarized under the umbrella term of ’reactionary modernism.’ In their deceptively simple presentation, New Women in the countryside rather presented a unique model of femininity, which visualised a feminine Austrian identity beyond reactionary politics.

Read the article here.