gregor, schlatte, gregor schlatte

eisenerz

Eisenerz – Shaping the Memory

Like a lot of small towns in the rural areas of Styria (Austria), Eisenerz is shrinking. The people are leaving these proud and old industrial cities. For a long period the “ore-mountain” provided work and wealth for the people of Eisenerz. Up to the 80ies about 10.000 people were employed in ore mining and the city had about 18.000 inhabitants. Now only 5.000 are left.

In Eisenerz two stories are interweaved. There is the still obvious heritage of industrialization. Stories of the glorious times can be heard in every inn. But this identity-concept becomes more and more challegend by a new “old” narrative, which tries to present Eisenerz as a normal mountain village, like in the movie “The Sound of Music”. This identitiy tries to establish a very stereotypical tradition.

The photos of this project are showing this struggle of identities and was developed as a multimedia piece. A different sound is backing up each one of these two main identities.