Swords into Souvenirs: Bosnian Arts and Crafts under Austro-Hungarian Administration Diana Reynolds Cordileone Professor of History, Point Loma Nazarene University dianareynolds@pointloma.edu Colonialism, Orientalism, and the Exhibitionary Complex in Bosnia-Hercegovina The invention, protection, and creation of culture in Sarajevo was an integral part of the Austro-Hungarian civilizing mission in Bosnia as scholars, administrators, and ethnographers swarmed into the region after 1878. During the following two decades their colonialist (and, at times Orientalist) imaginations were incorporated into the exhibitionary complex of the Viennese metropole; crafts, artefacts, and resources from the occupied territories were regularly displayed in museums and international exhibitions until 1914. One significant aspect of the culture of exhibition and display was the taming of the Bosnian warrior and his transformation from a dreaded enemy in 1878 into a fiercely loyal defender of the Dual Monarchy by the beginning of the Great War. This occurred in at least three ways. First, starting in 1885, the ethnographer Friedrich Salomo Krauss traveled throughout the territories at the behest of the Vienna Anthropological Society and began to document the warrior songs, the Gusarenlieder, as part of the legacy of Bosnian fighters since the middle age s. Krauss traveled to the occupied territories in 1885 under the auspices of the Vienna Anthropological Society. See Daxelműller, Christoph: Friedrich Salomo Krauss (Salomon Friedrich Kraus(s))(1859-1938). In: Jakobeit, Wolfgang: Vˆlkische Wissenschaft. Gestalten und Tendenzen der deutschen und ˆsterreichischen Volkskunde in der ersten H‰lfte des 20. Jahrhunderts. Kˆln,Weimar 1994 S.461-476; and Krauss, Friedrich S.: Slavische Volksforschungen: Abhandlungen ¸ber Glauben, Gewohnheitsrechte, Sitten und Br‰uche und die Guslarenlieder der S¸dslaven. Vorwiegend auf Grund eigener Erhebungen, Leipzig: Wilhelm Hiems 1908 Krauss, Friedrich S., Thomas Dragicevic: "Guslarenlieder aus Bosnien und dem Herzogsland", in: Am Ur-Quell, 1890, 1, S. 2-6 Krauss’s anthropological work validated the warrior traditions of the region while making them accessible to the scholarly gazes of the European anthropologist and folklorist. Second, the Bosnian warriors were physically transformed into an exotic and elite fighting unit in the Austro-Hungarian army. The Bosniak divisions of the k.u.k. army created a stir wherever they were stationed and inspired fantasies of former enemies now turned faithful sons of the Empire. Werner Schachinger, Die Bosniaken kommen! Elitetruppe in der k.u.k. Armee 1879-1918, Graz: Leopold Stocker Verlag, 1989. Finally the traditional weaponry of Bosnia was transformed into quaint souvenirs for consumption by tourists and occupation soldiers. These crafts, along with their practicing artisans, were regularly displayed in Vienna and at international exhibitions as proof of the civilizing effects of Austrian administration in the region. It is this last transformation of Bosnian artisanal traditions--swords into souvenirs--that is the subject of this essay. After 1878, both colonialist and Orientalist rhetoric shaped the rehabilitation of Bosnian crafts, including weaponry and metalwork, in both Vienna and the occupied territories. The English historian Tony Bennett has coined the phrase the “exhibitionary complex,” to describe the new institutions and disciplines of knowledge, such as art history and anthropology, that emerged in the second half of the nineteenth century. These scholarly disciplines worked hand in hand to exhibit their achievements at temporary events--such as world’s fairs--and at the new public museums that proliferated in Europe after the London Crystal Palace Exhibition of 1851. For Bennett, the rise of the exhibitionary complex also represented a softer form of state power; its denizens organized knowledge for the purpose of “winning the hearts and minds” of citizens, educating the masses and communicating state ideologies. Colonialist and Orientalist approaches to the occupied territories shaped the exhibitionary complex inVienna. Despite its lack of overseas colonies, the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy behaved like a colonial power in Bosnia and Hercegovina. In this, the Dual Monarchy was no different from the other European “Great Powers” that were dividing the world among themselves. The Berlin Conference of 1878, in which Austria was given the mandate to occupy the Ottoman territories, brought forth a new era of global imperialism: The island of Cyprus was granted to the British Empire, setting the stage for its occupation of Egypt; meanwhile it was understood that France would occupy Tunisia. Within a few years England and France had acted on these opportunities and the Scramble for Africa began in earnest. From a global perspective, the prelude to the Scramble was the Austro-Hungarian occupation of Bosnia and Hercegovina. For the purposes of clarity in this essay, I shall use the term Bosnia to refer to the occupied terrritories of Bosnia and Hercegovina and the term Austrian to refer to the Austro-Hungarian administrators of the Landesregierung. Many Europeans interpreted the occupation of Bosnia as a colonial move; Bosnia was the Austrian alternative to a stake in Africa. As a parliamentarian in the German Reich expressed it during a colonial debate, Austrians had the better deal: “That little slice of Hercegovina could well be worth more than the whole of East Africa.” Bosniche Post, 30 Jan. 1889, 1. “Das bisschen Hercegovina sei noch immer mehr werth, als ganz Ostafrika.” A Habsburgertreu Czech used another colonial metaphor: “In terms of geographical science, Bosnia and Hercegovina have been very much like the great white spaces on the maps of central Africa.” Abel Luksic. Bosnien und die Hercegovina Lexikon, Prag: Alois Hynek, 1878, 1. Bosnia was Austria’s Africa, an unknown space on the map of southeastern Europe, waiting to be rescued from Ottoman tyranny, explored, and brought into the light of western scholarship. Besides serving as Austria’s Africa, both the proximity of Bosnia to the Dual Monarchy’s borders and the Ottoman legacy of the region fueled the Orientalist fanasties of its occupiers. Andre Gingrich has described the interaction between occupiers and the occupied as “frontier Orientalism” a process that, unlike Said’s definition of Orientalism, was shaped by the lack of distance between Austria and the territories. This resulted in a feeling of familiarity mixed with fear; a master narrative that had two components with regard to the inhabitants of the region: On one hand he [the Bosnian] appears as a dangerous Turkish soldier, an armed representative of another high culture, an equal military foe whose defeat is necessary for one’s own imperial ascent. On the other hand, he appears as a subjugated Bosnian colonial who remains loyal to the end, fighting against the enemies of the Empire.” Gingrich, André: Frontier Orientalism. In: http://campcatatonia.org/article/1555/frontier-orientalism (2006). In keeping with a shifting perspective that was both colonialist and Orientalist, Austrians believed that it was incumbent upon them to introduce civilization to the former Ottoman regions. During a visit to Sarajevo in 1888, Crown Prince Rudolf declared: “Our mission [here] is to bring western culture to the Orient.” Bosnische Post 48 (17 June 1888), 2. For Austrian patriots the enlightened administration of the territories was to serve as a model of colonial rule for other European Great Powers. Those wishing to understand how to rule their overseas colonies wisely and well need only look at the Austrians in Bosnia. Henri Moser, Bosnie-Herzegovine: Une oeuvre de colonization pacifique das les Balkans, Paris: V. Goupy et G. Maurin, Successors, 1896. To demonstrate how colonialist/orientalist perceptions of the occupied territories merged with the exhibitionary complexes of the western metropoles we begin with a case study: The Bosnian Peddler. II. The Bosnian peddler Vienna was a multi cultural and cosmopolitan city in the late nineteenth century. As imperial capital of a multinational empire and a growing industrial center, it was home to a variety of ethnic groups ranging from Bohemian factory workers to Galician Jews. In the late 1880s, however, one more colorful figure could be seen on the streets of Vienna: the Bosnian peddler, selling his wares from door to door. An article in the Bosnian Post described him in the following way: These peddlers from “new Austria” are clothed in the national costume, wearing narrowly pleated pants, colorful bordered jackets, the fez, and wide belts which hold a threatening array of small weapons. Carrying practically an entire arsenal, these peddlers are a walking warehouse of ivory-inlaid knives, match boxes, and cigar holders made of rosewood. … These peddlers are a type of pioneer, who seek to find a market for their admittedly modest goods in the great metropole of the Empire. They give an Oriental flair to Vienna’s streets, but they are also a constant reminder of our mission in the East. “Bosniche Hausirer in Wien,”Bosniche Post IV, Nr. 12 (13 Febuary 1889), 2-3. The Bosnian peddler might have resembled a poorer version of a mannequin in Sarajevo’s Regional Museum (Zemalski Museji-Landesmuseum), which was created at about the same time. (Figure 1) The figure presents a Muslim aristocrat, whose smiling eyes and gentle demeanor are in sharp contrast to the weapons he carries. His right hand holds a flintlock, and his fabric belt is stuffed with daggers and pistols. This benign and tamed Muslim (who was displayed in Vienna in 1891 Karl Masner, Die Costümausstellung im k.k. österr. Museum 1891. Wien: J. Löwy, 1894; Wissenschaftliche Mittheilungen aus Bosnien 2(1894) 504-508; Katalog der bosnisch-herzegowinischen Abtheilung, Costüme-Ausstellung im k.k. österreich. Museum. Wien, Garl Gerold's Sohn 1891.) was an ideological construction, but for the moment, let us simply imagine a more shabbily clad version of this figure, and we can picture our Bosnian peddler. The lively and humorous description of the peddler as bristling with weapons on the streets of Vienna is rich with the vocabulary of the Austrian colonial/orientalist discourse regarding Bosnia ; the occupied territories are christened “new Austria;” The fierce-looking Bosnian is merely a simple peddler who is a cultural pioneer; He is not a threat but a reminder of the Austrian civilizing mission to the East. The items in his arsenal--knives, pistols and powder boxes--were part of one of the most important initiatives of the Occupation Government in Bosnia: The rehabilitation of Bosnian crafts begun by the Reichsfinanzminister Benjamin von Kállay in 1887. This reform involved the aesthetic education of Bosnian craftsmen. The outcome of this process was intended not only to improve Bosnian products but also to create loyal Bosnians, grateful to their new masters for the gifts of education and modernization. In Vienna, on the other hand, the process involved communicating a colonial and Orientalist ideology to the citizens of the metropole and re-casting the populations of Bosnian as happy subjects of Austro-Hungarian rule. A postcard from Sarajevo published two decades after the occupation depicts this fantasy projection as docile metalworkers work diligently in a Government craft atelier. (Figure 2) The population of Bosnia was not so pacific in 1878. Despite the hopes of the Foreign Minister, Count Andrassy, that the Austrian forces could occupy the territories with little effort (a squadron of Hussars and a regimental band), Engelbert Deusch, “Andrassy und die Okkupation Bosniens und der Hercegovina,” in Oesterreichische Osthefte 12: 1970, 18-36. the Habsburg forces met with serious resistance from well-organized forces, including the national militia sent out from Sarajevo, and bands of Muslim and Serbian fighters. This delayed the progress of Austrian troops and the fight for Sarajevo was unexpectedly difficult. After entering Sarajevo on 19 August, the Austro-Hungarian commander Filipovic requested reinforcements; eventually over 250,000 men (roughly one third of the k.u.k. army) were required to put an end to local resistance. The ferocity of the fighting was legendary, with accounts of decapitation and mutilations by Bosnian insurgents. Like their Montenegrin neighbors, the mountain fighters in Bosnia had the ability to melt away before the Austrian forces only to reappear in guerilla operations. Ursula Reber, “Habsburgische Begegnungen mit nomadischen Kriegerstämmen Montenegro als strategischer Schauplatz,” in Kakanien Revisited http://www.kakanien.ac.at/beitr/fallstudie/UReber4 The warlike populations of southeastern Europe were part of a standard topos of travel literature well before the military occupation. Cite Clemens Ruthner, “Kakanien’s Little Orient,” in Kakanien Revisited http://www.kakanien.ac.at/beitr/fallstudie/CRuthner5An English visitor to Sarajevo in 1875 (shortly before the uprising) described the proliferation of weapons and the warlike population: Another street [in Sarajevo] resounded with the hammers of coppersmiths, moulding their metal into coffee-pots or platters; … or we came upon a group of armourers’ shops—to-day ominously thronged—bristling with knives and swords of the famed Bosnian steel. Arthur J. Evans, Through Bosnia and the Herzegovina on Foot during the Insurrection, August and September 1875. Reprint edition (New York: Arno Press, 1971)274. These ominous throngs eventually became the resistance of 1878 and Austrians contended with insurgents, who were often called brigands for political purposes, for four years after the military occupation. The Bosnian warrior was a fearsome opponent, and the mission of Austro-Hungarian rule was to subjugate, tame, and redirect this warrior spirit. In 1882, the Hungarian nobleman Benjamin von Kállay was named the Reichsfinanzminister thereby becoming the civilian administrator of the region. Tomislav Kralja%I%, Kalajev Re%im u Bosni I Hercegovini (1882-1903), Sarajevo: Veselin Masle%a, 1987. Kállay firmly believed that institutions of good government would eventually create loyal subjects. In an interview with the English newspaper, The Daily Chronicle, he described his aims: To make the people contented, to ensure justice, to develop agriculture, to render communication easy and cheap, to spread education, to retain that ancient traditions of the land vivified and purified by modern ideas—that is my administrative ideal. …. Austria… is a great Occidental Empire, charged with the mission of carrying civilization to Oriental peoples …. “Round the Near East,” [Interview with Benjamin von Kállay] in The Daily Chronicle 3 October 1895. In the years following Kállay’s appointment, he attempted to win the favor of the local populations through the institutions of scholarship, education, and display. Kállay employed the exhibitionary complex of Vienna for the “vivification and purification” of the artisanal traditions of the region. The outcome of these efforts was transformation of traditional Bosnian weaponry into exotic trinkets for the tourist trade or for sale on the streets of Vienna. III. Vienna in Sarajevo By the late 1880s the effects of Austrian administration in Sarajevo were visible in a variety of ways. Monumental construction projects such as the new cathedral or the government palace had begun to recreate urban landscape of provincial capital. See Robert Donia: Sarajevo. A Biography,Ann Arbor: Michigan UP 2006, 67-82. The influx of soldiers, entrepreneurs, and administrators contributed to a significant rise in population and contributing to the ethnic and religious diversity of the city. Heuberger, Valeria. “Politische Institutionen und Verwaltung in Bosnien und der Hercegovina 1878-1918” in Die Habsburger Monarchie 1848-1918, Bd. VII. Vienna: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2000. In 1887, Kállay embarked on a program to rehabilitate Bosnian crafts after noting the decline of local industries, largely due to the influx of cheap industrial products from western Europe. Archiv BiH, ZMF-prz., B.H. 91/1887;Kucna Radinost, Sifra 43/14/7. Benjamin von Kállay, ”Zur Frage des kunstgewerblichen Reforms im Occupations Gebiet” Wien 10 Feb. 1887, Starting that year, he established government ateliers and craft schools in Sarajevo and other Bosnian towns to instruct a new generation of handworkers in traditional techniques. Kállay’s efforts to retain Bosnian craft were undoubtedly one component of his larger effort to create a regional identity, Bosnianism, that cut against emergent religious nationalisms. This effort eventually failed, howeverr. For a discussion of Bosnianism and its relationship to the Bogumil traditions see Robert Donia, Sarajevo, 88-91. Nevertheless Kállay also envisioned creating viable local industries that could compete with western products, thereby enhancingAustrian prestige as a faithful steward of the mandate of 1878. Finally, Bosnian crafts were to serve as a source of revenue for the Administration, for the Austrian and Hungarian delegations that approved the occupation declined to authorize funds to support civilian administration of the territories. Thus Kállay had to find new and creative ways to finance his government. Robert J. Donia, Islam under the Double Eagle: The Muslims of Bosnia and Hercegovina 1871-1914, New York: Eastern European Monographs, 1981, 11. No doubt he hoped that sales of Bosnian crafts would ultimately contribute to budget. To accomplish his aesthetic and commercial goals, Kállay relied on an extensive structure of craft education that was already well-established in cisleithanian Austria. Since 1863, the Austrian Museum for Art and Industry in Vienna had managed craft education through a well-developed network of local and regional craft schools. The focus of the Museum had begun with industrialists, but since the 1870s the Museum and its educators had become more deeply involved in the improvement of the folk arts in the peripheral regions of the Empire where industrial processes had not yet completely displaced local handicrafts. For a detailed history of the origins of the Museum, see the exhibition catalog Kunst und Industrie, ed. Peter Noever, Vienna: Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2000. For a discussion of the House-industry schools, see my article “Die österreichische Synthese” in. In an effort to sustain the local populations and give them livelihoods beyond agricultural work, several schools for national “House industry” (Hausindustrie) were created in the 1870s. By the time Kállay began his intiative, the Museum in Vienna had already experienced some success in popularizing a variety of ethnic crafts (folk arts) through its nexus of education and display. Kállay adopted the Viennese model for Bosnia by establishing government craft ateliers in Sarajevo, Livno, and Foca. Bericht über die Verwaltung von Bosnien und der Hercegovina 1906. Vienna, k. u. k. gemeinsamen Finanzministerium, 1906. The artisans’ willingness to enter a government sponsored atelier was probably an indicator of the degree to which craft production had suffered through cheap foreign imports. Kallay’s plan included schools for carpets, embroideries, wood crafts, building, and metal working. But his efforts to revive weaponry crafts included ateliers dedicated to both metal wire and mother of pearl inlay, which were commonly found on pistols, sabers and daggers, trades practiced exclusively by Muslims. And, although our English visitor described a lively weapons industry in Sarajevo in 1875, this artisanal tradition had almost completely died out. Only one living practicioner of metal wire inlay could be found in 1887. “Bericht über eine Reise nach Bosnien,” Khartoum, 11 September 1905. Sarajevo Archiv BiH, ZVS 1905, K. 123 S 115-29/05, p.6. Although he died within a year, government authorities prided themselves in having created an environment where he could pass along his expertise to the next generation. But rehabilitating Bosnian crafts also meant refining them for urban markets, for Kállay’s goal was to attract customers in the cities. Creating objects for a western market for the Bosnian peddler’s “modest goods” invariably meant improving them for the tastes of city consumers. Bosniche Post IV, Nr. 12 (13 Febuary 1889), 2-3. As a result, craft educators in Bosnia had the dual mandate to retain Bosnian craft traditions and inculcate the aesthetic principles of the west. This meant exposing local artisans to the aesthetic standards of the metropole. To that end, the Sarajevo silversmith, Mustafa Bektić, traveled to Vienna to study principles of classical drawing at the Museum for Art and Industry’s Kunstgewerbeschule in 1889. Bektić was given a contract to teach in a government atelier in 1888. Sarajevo, Archiv BiH Allgemeine Landesregierung, 1888 god. Kutija 8/ K 58 42-370 , 137. In addition the cadre of craft teachers from Austria (each an absolvent of the craft education system in cisleithania) who arrived in Bosnia after 1887 brought their training with them. After being assigned to Saraejvo in the 1890s, the Czech born craft school teacher Alois Studnićka wrote design handbooks in the local language that introduced the major historical styles for application in mosaics, inlaid wood, or drawing. (Figure 3) Alois Studnićka, Zbirka Pregledalcia za prostoruko crtajne II: Intarzije. Sarajevo: Zemalska Vlada da Bosnu I Hercegovina, 1898. In this regard, arts and crafts education in Sarajevo was a hegemonic discourse, emanating from Vienna, and disseminated through the government craft schools and ateliers in Sarajevo and other major towns. The new Regional Museum in Sarajevo also contributed to this educational project. Founded in 1888, the Museum quickly amassed a large collection of weapons, textiles and other objects that became the foundation of ethnographic research in the occupied territories. For an excellent description of the formation of the Regional Museum, see Robert J. Donia, Sarajevo, 88-91; Constantin Hörmann, “Zur Geschichte des bosnisch-Hercegovinischen Landesmuseums, “in Wissenschaftliche Mittheilungen aus Bosnien 1 (1893) 1-25. for the history of the Provincial Museum in Sarajevo. See also, Wenzel, Marian: Bosanski stil na stećcima i metalu [Bosnian Style on Tombstones and Metal]. Sarajevo: Sarajevo Publishing 1999, pp. 21-30, pp. 171-180. The Museum’s best examples of craft items were also shared with the craft schools permitting students to observe and imitate well made objects. In this way, an institution of the emerging exhibitionary complex interacted with education, artisanal traditions, and commerce in Sarajevo. A rhetoric of redemption and paternalism accompanied the two way exchange between metropole and periphery in Sarajevo. The goal of craft education in Bosnia was not only to rescue and refine local traditions , it was also intended to create a generation of grateful subjects. As Markus Nani, the Czech-born Director of the Construction Woodworking School, told his graduating students in 1900, it was their task to remain grateful to the Government. “Do not forget,” he admonished, “the fatherly care that the government has dedicated to your education.” Bosnische Post, (3 January 1900),3. Despite the generous investment of the Administration , however, craft education in Bosnia was not intended to turn the “sons into the fathers.” Bosnische Post, (10 December, 1889) 1. The rehabilitation of Bosnian craft was a mixture of paternalist pedagogy and colonialist rhetoric conducted by Austrian administrators. Yet the influence of the Austrians was not unilateral. Bosnia was becoming part of the colonial/oriental imagination of the metropolitan populations. IV. Sarajevo in Vienna The institutions of the exhibitionary complex introduced the mystique of Bosnia—Austria’s Colonial Orient—to the metropoles of western Europe. Starting with its own offices and expanding into local and international exhibitions, the Bosnian administration (Landesregierung) disseminated the message of cultural redemption and the benefits of Austrian rule. The headquarters of the craft education office for Bosnia was located in Vienna’s first district, not far from the Museum for Art and Industry. The “Bosnian Bureau” (as it was called) occupied three nearby locations between 1881 and 1905. With each move the space became larger and more sumptuous. The most interesting aspect of the Bureau, however, was that it combined office and retail spaces. Administrators worked on the upper floors, but the ground floor was a shop for Bosnian crafts. Objects produced at government ateliers in Sarajevo made their way directly to the shop in Vienna. Archiv BH, ZVS VI; Prz,B.H. 1892 4-41/92, Kunstgewerbe und Gewerberförderungsamt (1892) 44-1/KG. Carpet design #2, weighing 24.5 kg., measuring 4.80m x 4.80m was delivered to Vienna “for the office of Herr Ministerialrath Schmulmayer.” Most of the other carpets in this shipment were intended for sale. The cost to produce each carpet is carefully noted in each shipment. Both the office letterhead and advertisements in local journals depicted the arts and crafts of Bosnia. (Figure 4) To publicize its efforts the administration also sponsored regular exhibitions of Bosnian crafts at other locations in Vienna as well. Staring in 1888, the Bosnian Bureau participated in the annual Christmas exhibition at the Museum for Art and Industry. Due do their exotic appeal, the Bosnian crafts attracted a great deal of public attention and sold out quickly. For the administration, this was an unmitigated public success and Bosnian crafts were sold at every annual Christmas bazaar thereafter. But the displays of Bosnia in Vienna were not merely commercial. In 1889, the Bosnian carpet factory and school contributed Bosnian carpets to the Museum for Art and Industry’s Twenty-fifth Anniversary exhibition. The Bosnian carpets, which had been “improved” by the Vienna Kunstgewerbeschule Director, Josef von Storck, were hailed as the crowning decoration of the exhibition. Allgemeine Kunst Chronik 13 (1889) 233 f. This article, entitled “New-Austria's Arts and Crafts" details the activities of the crafts schools and the Regional Museum in Sarajevo. C.f., Bosnische Post IV, Nr. 98 (11.Dez. 1889). 54-55. For Josef von Storck, the Museum’s Kunstgewerbeschule, and Storck’s involvement in Bosnian crafts see Ulrike Scholda, Theorie und Praxis im Wiener Kunsstgewerbe des Historismus am Beispiel von Josef Ritter von Storck 1830-1902. Dissertation, Salzburg, 1991, 54-55. They also unmasked the hybrid character of craft rehabilitation in Bosnia. As one observer blithely noted: The wool is of Bosnian origin, ... [but] it is brought to Vienna to be dyeed and then sent back down there to be worked. Also the designs and motifs are old, but hey have been happily updated and refined by Storck’s artistic hands. Allgemeine Kunst-Chronik 13 (1889) S. 235; See also Scholda, p. 55. Wool from Bosnia, dyed in Vienna, was returned to Bosnia to be woven into carpets according to improved Viennese designs. Allgemeine Kunst Chronik 13 (1889) 233. It surprised no one that the revival of Bosnian carpets occurred under the supervision of Viennese educators utilizing the superior industrial techniques of the metropole. After 1889, Bosnian crafts began to receive international acclaim at exhibitions elsewhere on the continent: Karlsruhe 1891, Budapest 1896, Brussels 1897 and culminating in Paris 1900. Das Kunstgewerbe in Bosnien und der Herecegovina auf der deutschen Fächer-Ausstellung in Karlsruhe 1891. Wien: Reisser & Wethner, 1891. The revival of Bosnian craft was taken as proof of Austria’s benign administration of its proximate colony. The exotic appeal of Bosnia in Vienna created another public sensation in 1891 at the Museum for Art and Industry’s Costume Exhibition. The Museum had planned an extensive historical exhibition, but at the last minute its administrators accepted Benjamin von Kállay’s offer of a collection of ethnographic costumes from the Regional Museum in Sarajevo. The costume collection in Sarajevo had grown steadily and, inspired by the mannequins of Swedish folk costumes at the Paris Exhibition of 1889, administrators in Sarajevo had recently ordered a set of lifelike mannequins for its collection. These were no ordinary mannequins, however; each figurine was designed to correspond visually (skin color, facial features, hair color) with the ethnic or regional origins of its costume. Archiv BiH ZVS, Zemalski Museji, 1890, šifra 41-77, p. 3-5. In addition, each figurine was furnished with the appropriate accessories to complete its look: pistols, pipes, looms, metal bowls or cilims as appropriate. When the two dozen figures from Sarajevo were arrayed in the Museum for Art and Industry’s entrance hall, they quickly became a major attraction.(Figure 5) Twenty more figures were stationed throughout the Museum. Insofar as the lifelike figures carried the attributes of their ethnicity, religion, and occupation they blended scholarly accuracy with the public spectacle of colonial exhibitions. For special effect the genial Bosnian nobleman (Figure 1) was stationed in the center of the entrance hall, welcoming visitors to the display. This figure became a standard image of Austrian rule in Bosnia. His smile indicated that, despite his weapons, Austrians now had nothing to fear from this Bosnian. A wise and tolerant occupation government had won over the local population. These mannequins became the Administration’s silent ambassadors, gracing every subsequent international exhibition of the Bosnian Landesregierung . Exhibiton organizers used heraldic arrangements of weaponry, glass vitrines, and armor-clad mannequins to display both old traditions and new products from the craft schools. Most of the latter were for sale. (Figures 6 and 7) The rehabilitation of Bosnian craft traditions blended the scholarship and spectacle of the exhibitionary complex and a colonial/Orientalist rhetoric of a civilizing mission, with an added commercial twist. Meanwhile the aesthetic improvement of Bosnian/Turkish weaponry was accompanied by several changes in its use. Back in Sarajevo, the right of Muslims to carry weapons became severely restricted under Austrian administration. As one observer noted: Under the Ottomans, Bosnian men “armed themselves with damascene swords, daggers, pistols and muskets. Hundreds of skilled craftsmen found work and were able to support themselves” Sarajevo, Archiv BiH, ZVS 1905 Kut 123, Sifra 115 – 29/05. Anonomyus. “Bericht über eine Reise nach Bosnien” Khartoum, 11 September 1905, p. 5. ...[in former times] … die Manner bewaffneten sich mit samarcierten Schwerten, Dochlen… Pistolen und Musketen. Hunderte von geschichter Arbeiter fanden dadurch Arbeit und Lebensunterhalt. In 1897, however, a visitor from Berlin noted a change : These richly ornamented weapons can now be worn only by a few, privileged men. They may not actually use them however, so it is a natural outcome that soon no one will expend the effort to make them. Bartels, M. “Hausgewerblichen Gegenstände aus Bosnien.“ Verhandlung der Berliner Anthropologischen Gesellschaft. Sitzung von 20 Februar, 1897, 98-99. „Die Kunstreichen Waffen dürfen nur noch von wenigen, bevorzugten Maennern getragen werden. Benutzen dürfen sie dieselben aber nicht, und so ist es wohl natürlich, das man sich sehr bald nicht mehr die Mühe unterziehen wird, sie anzufertigen.“ The weaponry had become ornamental, a decoration of the few elite (and loyal) Muslim noblemen. By1900, however, the metal inlay and incrustation techniques were being applied to a new range of tourist items. In 1905 an observer remarked: “The products of these schools are … carefully made with the western market in mind. Instead of pistols and powder boxes, nowadays only inlaid cigarette holders, hatpins, picture frames, brushes, and letter openers are created.” Sarajevo, Archiv BiH, ZVS 1905 Kut 123, S.115 – 29/05. Anonomyus. “Bericht über eine Reise nach Bosnien” Khartoum, 11 September 1905, p. 8. Old, albeit improved, techniques had been adapted for new consumer demands. And the weaponry craftsmen –having lost the local market due to Austrian restrictions—found a new market in souvenir shops frequented by a growing number of tourists and successive contingents of k. und k. troops from all over the Monarchy. The trade in these ornamental weapons had always been strong and the presence of a quarter of a million troops in the region over three decades increased the demand. In 1875 the English traveler noted: “In the small Turkish market there were many second-hand goods, and amongst them magnificent flint locks of antique form, with stocks richly inlaid with mother of pearl and golden arabesques.” Evans, 274-275. These originals might no longer be available after 1900, but thanks to the craft schools, copies were. In the first decades of the twentieth century improved versions of these ornamental pistols, daggers and small sabers were an obligatory purchase for the soldiers who rotated through Bosnia until 1918. Many of these artifacts circulated among Vienna’s flea markets in the mid-twentieth century as weapons left behind from the Turskish siege of Vienna in 1683. My thanks to Mag.Christian Ortner of the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna, for this insight. Austrian administrators preferred to emphasize that aesthetic education, not military might, had led to both pacification and redemption in the region. The revival of Bosnian crafts testified to the success of the cvilizing mission. As Benjamin von Kállay’s supporters described it, Austria had conquered Bosnia twice: once through weapons but finally, and more importantly through wise administration and moral excellence. Bosnische Post, 1 (22 June 1884), 1. “Österreich hat Bosnien und die Hercegowina zum zweitenmal erobert, nich mehr durch die Gewalt der Waffen, sondern durch die Erfolge einer gerechten und weisen Verwaltung.” The dual conquest replaced Bosnian swordsmen with a “pacified” population of artisans who produced charming and exotic trinkets for city populations. The rehabilitation of Bosnian weaponry was an aestheticized form of frontier Orientalism. The remnants of Ottoman designs in the region were not aboriginal but the leftovers of a great civilization, a high culture. Ottoman designs could not be ignored or completely cast aside in favor of a western aesthetic so Austrian craft educators called for a revival. Yet the outcome of this process, for those who submitted to the demands of the craft schools, was the creation of yet another subjugated and aestheticized Bosnian colonial. The Bosnian craftsman working in the government workshop had replaced the Bosnian peddler. The crude weapons he carried in 1889 were transformed into exotic objects for western consumers. Bosnia stood as a reminder to the Viennese of the significance of their colonial mission, not to Africa, but to the orient next door. The putative success of that mission was celebrated through exhibitions in Vienna and abroad. V. Education in Deracination The occupied territories were an important part of Viennese consciousness and the Austrian imperial imagination before1900. Museum exhibitions, ethnographic research and popular entertainments indicate the many ways in which scholarly disciplines and popular culture were complicit in a colonial/Orientalist discourse. The two way exchange of designs indicates a hegemonic discourse that radiated out from Vienna, but it also illustrates several ways in which a widespread awareness of Bosnia and Bosnian designs entered Vienna, the Dual Monarchy, and western Europe. If, as Homi Bhaba has pointed out, the construction of national identities occurs through both pedagogic institutions and performative events (exhibitions and competitions), Dipesh Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial thought and Historical Difference, Princetion: Princeton UP, 2000, 10. Homi Bhabha, “DissemiNation” in The Location of Culture, London:Routledge, 1994, 153. the Austrian civilizing mission in the Balkans was also part of this discursive field. For Austrians, however, the identity they sought to construct in a Europe of nation states was not purely national, for that was impossible. Instead the rhetoric of Austrian identity emphasized and aestheticized pluralism. To be Austrian meant to respect, revive and consume the variety of crafts available from the many ethnic groups of the monarchy. The “colorful ethnic mosaic” of primitive crafts, all of which were continually exhibited in regional and international events, were constituent elements of an Austrian identity that, by 1900, was striving to rise above nationalisms. “Volkskunde: Vergleichende europaesiche Ethnograpie” in Ur-Ethnographie, edited by Franz Grisehofer, 14. (Kataloge des Oesterreichischen Museums fuer Volkskunde, Vol. 85) Vienna: 2004. In the case of Bosnia, it was as if a multinational Austria was uniquely qualified to administer and civilize a colony, perhaps better than any of the other European nations. As Kállay remarked, “We like Europe to know what we have done [in Bosnia] … and to say, “That is Austria!’” The Daily Chronicle, London: 3 October 1985. Benjamin von Kllay,. . It weighed 24 kilos and measured 4.80m x 4.80m. It had taken six women 13.5 days to produce, for which they received the total salary of Kr. 62.40 ABH ZVS Pr.B.H. 1892 4-41/92 This was not only an Orientalist and colonialist rhetoric that was imposed upon Bosnia, but it was also a supra-nationalist strategy for a multinational Empire. Yet the aesthetic education of the Bosnian man was a program for failure. In 1910 an observer from Vienna suggested that the handicraft educational systems had created an “education in deracination.” A. Vetter, Bericht über eine Studienreise nach Bosnien und der Herzegowina (September-October 1910). Unpublished manuscript, Öesterreichisches Musuem für Volkskunde, Vienna, 34. Vetter was Director of the Imperial-Royal Office for the Promotion of Trades. Everything, from the imposition of a standardized building style for school buildings to the preponderance of foreign bureaucrats and teachers, communicated only one thing to the inhabitants of Bosnia: “Everything here is bad! Everything here needs improvement!” Ibid., 33 &34. This message could only produce an undesirable radicalism among the young people of the newly annexed territories. In addition, the changes imposed on Bosnian crafts by well-meaning improvers created products created by a new proletariat that were neither appealing nor Bosnian. Ibid., 42 & 43. Describing the local cilims he wrote: To my astonishment I learned that in the Sarajevo weaving center they now only work according to established patterns, which was not the case years ago [before Austrian occupation]. When one restricts the weavers from the freedom to create their own patterns, which used to be determined by the local dyes and motifs, we are allowed to ask the question: what is specially “Bosnian” about these products? Ibid, 43. The National Museum of Bosnia and Hercegovina recently staged an exhibition of Bosnian carpets with illustrations of the patterns: Carpets in Bosnia and Hercegovina: The collection of the National Museum of B-H, Sarajevo: 2006. This education in deracination was typical of colonial administrations, and its complicity with institutions of the exhibitionary complex was clear to the young generation of nationalists that coalesced after the annexation of the provinces in 1908. Robert Donia, Sarajevo, 93-120. At the completion of the new building of the Regional Museum in 1913, some future members of the assassination group of 1914 participated in protests against the Museum as a symbol and instrument of Habsburg hegemony. These young men understood the political power of the exhibitionary complex in Sarajevo. The swords of Bosnia were not beaten into plowshares, they were transformed into decorative items for urban consumers. This was Austria aestheticized . Nevertheless the unintended outcomes of Kállay’s vision were deracination , resistance, and radicalism.  List of images “Mohamedaner (Aga) aus Sarajevo im Wafffenschmuck” from Karl Masner, Die Costümausstellung im k.k. österr. Museum 1891. Wien: J. Löwy, 1894. A Renaissance design from Alois Studnićka, Zbirka Pregledalcia za prostoruko crtajne II: Intarzije. Sarajevo: Zemalska Vlada da Bosnu I Hercegovina, 1898, p. # . Letterhead of Bosnian Bureau, Vienna 6/7. Austrian Museum for Art and Industry, Vienna. Central hall, Costume Exhibition 1891, from Illustrirte Frauen Zeitung (Berlin) XVIII, Heft 5, 1 März 1891, p 36 left/top right/bottom. “Alttürkischer Beg” is on page 34. “Selamluk u bosanskoj kući” Budapest Millennium Exhibition, 1896. From Nada 1 August 1896, 225. “Wedding in Bosnia” Set by Antonio Brioschi (1885-1920). Cf. .Franz Hadamowsky, Die Wiener Hoftheater Teil II (Wien:1975), S. 205. Brioschi studied under Josef von Storck at the Kunstgewerbeschule of the Austrian Museum in Vienna. My thanks to Dr. Elisabeth Grossegger (Wien) for this information. Appendix 1. … Hausirer aus Neu-Österreich, die als eine Art Pionniere, den Erzeugnissen ihrer heimatlichen, freilich noc bescheiden begrenzten Industrie in der Metropole des Reiches ein Absatgzgebiet zu erschliessen suchen. –BP (13 Feb 1889) 2 …stets an unseres ostliche Mission gemahnen. – BP (13 Feb 1889) 3. Filigree artisan Jovo Mitre∫cevic’ travels to Paris to exhibit at the World’s Exhibition Only person from B-H to display in Paris. Items of his were in the ethnographic collection of N.A. Plavc I c’ (Esseker Handels-und Gewerbekammer.) - BP 5 August 1889) 2. Kunstgewerblich Fachschulen goals not to turn the Söhne zu Herren. – BP Dec 1889, 1 Debate in German Parliament about East Africa, reported in BP 30 Jan 1889, 1. (The debate was held on 26. January, 1889) Present: Bismarck “Es handelt sich um Civilisation, und Christlichen Cultur…. Windhorst: … allein es duerfe nichts gescheh, was den grossen Hauptzweck der Bekaempfung der Sklaverei schaedige…. Parliamenterian nambed Baberger … against the project… saying this will end up just like France in Mexico. “Das bischen Hercegovina sei noch immer mehr werth, als ganz Ostafrika.” BP 30 Jan. 1889, 1. Hungarian Society for Voelkerkunde formed, Kállay named as Referent for the Bosnian Abtheilung, hopes he will serve as president. Anton Herrmann will be the librarian for the society. BP 9 Feb 1889. Conquest with weapons/conquest with moral excellence BP I (22 June 1884), 1. Kállay’s qualifications and success since named to the post in 1882. he can truthfully say To HIS and OUR sovereign. “Österreich hat Bosnien und die Hercegowina zum zweitenmal erobert, nich mehr durch die Gewalt der Waffen, sondern durch die Erfolge einer gerechten und weisen Verwaltung.” BP 22 June 1884, 1 Contract with silver worker Mustafa Bektic in Archiv BiH Allgemeine Landesregierung 1888 god. Kutija 8/ K 58 42-370 137. Sarajevo, AbiH, ZVS 1905 Kut 123, Sifra 115 – 29/05 God. 1906 Kut. 123/05 S115/29/05 Anonomyus. “Bericht über eine Reise nach Bosnien” Khartoum, 11 September 1905. … die Manner bewaffneten sich mit samarcierten Schwerten, Dochlen… Pistolen und Musketen. Hunderte von geschichter Arbeiter fanden dadurch Arbeit und Lebensunterhalt. Emphasizes Turkish pride in rich ornament. P5 P 6. einlege Arbeit in Metall: nur ein einziger Meister wurde noch gefunden von allen jenen welche früher das Gewerber der Waffenverzierung betrieben hatten…. P 8. Die erzeugte Arbeit ist … sorgfaltig für den europaischen Markt berechnet. Anstatt damascierte Pistolen und Schlachtbeilen werken eingelegte Cigerettnespitzen, Hutnadeln, Bilderrahmen, …Papiermesser, etc., angefertigt. 1890 god. Figurines. 41/70 10 Nov 1890. List of costumes for Vienna Costume Exhibit 37 Costumes, 10 Nove 1890 telegram from Vienna. 1890 god. Figurines. Instructions for costume manufacturer and physical description of figurines, hairdos, instructions for posing figures with appropriate procus such as pipes, spinning tools, etc. 41// 77/ 17 Bartels, Berlin Anthropol. Society 1897 20 Feb. Bosnian weapons Die Kunstreichen Wafen dufen nur noch von wenigen, bevorzugten Maennern getragen werden. Benutzen duerfen sie dieselben aber nicht, und so ist es wohl natuerlich, das ma / sich sehr bald nicht mehr die Muhe unterziehen wird, sie anzufertigen. (98-99) Bartels, M. “Hausgewerblichen Gegenstände aus Bosnien. Verhandlung der Berliner Anthropologischen Gesellschaft. Sitzung von 20 Februar, 1897. (MfVk, Vienna, library) Piece mostly about 12 wooden pieces, mostly Kerbschnitte sent to him by M. Hoernes. Discusses the possibility of continuity with Bogumil designs, Bartel concentrates on wood because it is not being preserved at the government ateliers. A, Vetter, “Bericht über eine Studienreise nach Bosnien und der Hercegowina.” Vienna, 1911 (manuscript). Asboth, Johann von. Bosnien und die Herzegowina: Reisebilder und Studien. Wien: Alfred Hoelder. 1888. [Önb 188748C] Asboth, Bosnian Weapons/ Kunstgewerbe / Inlay “ Filigree p. 170 Die byzantinischen und venetianischen Vorbilder herrschen egenso vor, wie be den Silber-Filigranarbeiten, die in jeder groesseren bosnischen Stadt von eigenen Kuenstlern verfertight werden. Spitze..Stade Foca. Also Livno (Silberdraht ausgelegte schwarze Hols… wird auch Lovnoer Arbeit, aber auch in Serajewo…. In engem Zusammenhange mit diesem Kunstgewerbe steht die Angertigung von Prunkwaffen und Messern. Obgleich mit dem Aufhoeren des allgemeinend Waffentragens auch die vorzuegliche Waffen-Schmiedekunst und der Waffenhandel grosse Eingusse erlitten, sin in der Carschija … noch immper Prunkwaffen, Handschare, Pistolen, Gewehre und Streitkolben zu finden. Der Griff und die Scheide zumeist von getriebenem Silber oder in Kuenstlerischer Filigran-Ausguehrung, die treffliche Klinge und die Laeufe mindestens mit dem Namen des Verfertigers, haeufing aber mit ganzen Spruechen und / 171Ornamenten in silberner oder goldener arablischer Schrift ausgelegt. Dumbas family in Wien sellst hese products. Same artisans also do wood paneling in wealthy homes. Arthur J. Evans. Through Bosnia and the Herzegovina on Foot during the Insurrection, August and September 1875. Reprint edition New York: Arno Press, 1971. Chapter VI The Panic in Serajevo. Outbreak of the Insurrection … Reception at English Consulate … P 246 description of troubles of 1851, Serajevo remains more than ever the focs of the Mahometan fanaticism of Bosnia. Mr. Holmes, English Consul in Serajevo. 249 At the English consulate … (sight of English flowers in Consul gardens) … making us realize what a paradise this land might become in civilized hands. 250 Two English ladies – Mis Irby and Mis Muir Mackenzie – 1865 Miss Irby in Serajevo, devoted their lives to a propaganda of culture among the Bosnian Christian women. 253 ]August 22 -23– 1875, Author in Serajevo] Description of Carsia-market. Gives a “exhaustive knowledge of the industries of Serajevo. 274 Another street resounded with the hammers of coppersmiths, moulding their metal into coffee-pots or platters; … or we came upon a group of armourers’ shops—to-day ominously thronged—bristling with knives and swords of the famed Bosnian steel. In the small Bezestan were many second-hand goods, and amongst them magnificent flint locks of antique form, with stocks richly inlaid with mother of pearl and golden /arabesqueses…274/275 But the part of the bazaar which interested us most was the goldsmiths’ quarter. Here sate [sic?] a whole street full of cunning artificers, pinching and twisting the precious metals—but chiefly silver—into brooches, beads, rings and ear-rings o filigree work—charming, both from its intrinsic elegance and from its clearly marked Byzantine parentages. The Serajevan work, pure and simple, though not without merit, is somewhat coarse, and we were pleased to find that the more graceful flowers of silver-work had been engrafted on the rude Bosnian stock by the taste of an English lady. Mrs. Holmes, the wife of our hospitable Consul, brought over some of the chefs-d’oeuvre of Maltese filigree-work and set these as models for the smiths of Serajevo, who have so profited by the lesson that they are now almost able to compete with the productions of the more refined Italian artists. The Serajevan work has not, however degenerated into mere imitation: certain native characteristics are still traceable in the new style. 275 Irby “Bosnia in 1875” Victoria Magazine, November 1875. eynolds, 30 1