Looted Books
The Austrian National Library confronts its Nazi Past

In this exhibition the Austrian National Library touches the darkest and most inglorious chapter of its history - the aggressive acquisition policy at the time of the Nazi reign. Led by the fanatic national socialist, the former general manager Paul Heigl, the Austrian National Library took active and extensive part in the systematic loot of especially the Jewish fellow citizens.

Carefully judged, the accession of at least 150.000 printed objects and 45.000 objects from collections came unlawfully - through confiscation of the politically and racially persecuted victims of the Nazi regime - to the Austrian National Library. Not counted are such objects which did not stay in the National Library but were forwarded to other libraries or institutions in the German Reich. After the war part of the books and collections were restituted, a substantial part of the looted books and objects stayed in the library as if they were acquired legally.

The Austrian National Library worked with great intensity on the topic 'restitution' in the last three years. In December 2003 it presented a 3.000 page Report of origin, as ordered by the law about restitutions of art objects from the year 1998, with an exact listing of all unlawfully acquired objects which are still in the library. The aim is to return the looted property - still more than 25.000 objects - to the heirs and inheritors of the former owners if they can be found. Through this act, after more than half a century, the library wants to close the humiliating chapter in its history.

With the exhibition Looted Books the Austrian National Library wants to draw attention to this in the public tabooed topic and, through the representative choice of exhibited objects, bring to light the brutal and unscrupulous acquisition policy of those days. In very few cases we find valuable books and often the tragic of the looted objects lies in the commercial valuelessness and worthlessness - the fact, that under the Nazi regime all of the victims' belongings were robbed without choice, everything was looted.

The exhibition, whose curators are Margot Werner and Christina Köstner, should on the one hand draw attention to some exemplary cases of aggrieved people who present the wrongs done to them very personally. On the other hand the over all situation of the library under the Nazi regime with personal and political involvement of those staff members who were responsible for the outrageous actions, should be shown. The timeframe of the exhibition program goes far beyond the restitution efforts after the end of World War II till the source research in the present.
Besides many until today nowhere published photos and historical file records which still exist in the archive of the National Library, a sample of confiscated books and collected objects will be presented. Many of them still bear traces of their former owners, in some of them we find a book plate or a handwritten note. Besides that the whole Report of origin can be looked at.

With the exhibition and the restitution of the looted books the Austrian National Library does not only want to fulfill its compulsory duty but rather point out its moral obligation, responsibility and engagement. Also in the future this lucent commitment should lead to a complete revelation of this shameful past.

A catalogue, edited by Murray G. Hall, Christina Köstner and Margot Werner, will be published to accompany the exhibition. Besides a historical survey and six case studies about individual fate it shows many pictures. A subject index, index of all people mentioned, as well as a complete index of all exhibits are part of the catalogue as well.

The Austrian National library confronts its Nazi Past will be presented in the State Hall of the Austrian National Library.