Dean Maassen

The first private, later state-funded Wiener Frauenakademie (Vienna Women's Academy), originally called Kunstschule für Frauen und Mädchen (Art School for Women and Girls), was an artistic educational institution for women in Vienna founded in 1897. The school was opened at a time when women who wanted to be educated in painting, graphic arts or sculpture were still obliged to take private lessons.

In five months, the list of female students at the Vienna Women's Academy has been compiled, copied and digitized with the help of archives, libraries and associations of Vienna in order to contribute to the reappraisal of the history of Austrian female artists of the past century and to facilitate future research. The student index is incomplete from the year 1916. Every person is given the opportunity to participate in this project by contributing to complete the list.

During the exhibition “WILD SPOERRI ROSENSTEIN”, the index hung opposite the assemblage "From the very Bottom of Silence" by Holocaust survivor Erna Rosenstein. She is the only recorded student of these years.

I would like to say thank you to Prof. Marina Gržinić, the Austrian Association of Women Artists (VBKÖ), Adam Szymczyk, Prof. Friedrich C. Heller, Wienbibliothek, Library of the Akademie of Fine Arts Vienna, Austrian National Library Vienna, University of Applied Arts Vienna Library and Zacharias Lojenburg