#Prater Park

[podraje]

Prater Park, Wien 2023

[hsmagazine254]

Vienna, Austria: A Vibrant Journey through Imperial Majesty

Vienna, Austria Welcome to Vienna, the enchanting Austrian capital that exudes imperial grandeur, artistic flair, and a vibrant contemporary spirit. This city effortlessly weaves together its rich history with modern innovation, offering travellers an unforgettable experience. From iconic attractions and indulgent shopping to delectable culinary delights and unique experiences, Vienna has…

[publiccollectors]

Wurstelprater in October New Public Collectors publication! Available for $9.00 here. Public Collectors publication #81 takes a trip to an amusement park in Vienna just days before many of the attractions closed for the season. From the back cover:

When the Vienna Art Book Fair’s Director Marlene Obermayer invited the publishing imprint I co-run, Half Letter Press, to participate in the 2023 edition of the event, she generously booked a hotel room for me. Last time the fair was held in 2019, the hotel was a short stroll to the fair. This time it was about a 25 minute walk. She explained, “Its not the same like last time but also a really nice one (next to the famous PRATER).” I wondered why I had never heard of the Prater and meant to look it up before my trip. In the frenzy of packing books, I never got around to that. Instead I found out when I arrived. 

Founded in 1766, the Prater includes a massive amusement park (Wurstelprater) filled with dozens of garish rides, an enormous Ferris wheel, tests of strength and skill, bizarre sculptures and gnarly ride facades covering every surface, and a variety of restaurants and other delights. You don’t have to pay to get in—there’s just a fee for whatever rides and games you want to enjoy. You can walk through the park any time, including before it opens, which I did on the way to and from the fair every morning and evening. At night it’s a whole other reality with dazzling lights, pounding music, and rides whipping bodies in every direction, testing any visitor’s ability to hold in their wurst. As one YouTube video-maker commented, the Prater “feels like a carnival on steroids.”

These photos were taken in the third week of October, just days before most of the rides would shut down for the season. The Wurstelprater is a fully immersive experience that could never be fully documented in all of its countless details. Anyone thinking this booklet might ruin the surprise of visiting for the first time should know that I have barely scratched the surface. 

— Marc Fischer / Public Collectors

[moonsinkfoxgirl]

went to the planetarium today, it was super nice^^

it turns out reflective nebula are made from diamonds, and that stars actually pulsate a bunch before they die, didn't know these things before

[30-before-30-but-im-27]

Prater, a vintage amusement park in Vienna, Austria. The oldest ride is from 1897 and the entry is free! The rides are about €5 - €7 each.

[vintagecamping]

Making time for a shave.

Brent Lake, Quetico Provincial Park

1948

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Formula 1 · Prater Vienna 2023

[8iunie]

via Damiano’s Instagram story, 27.04.2023

[cbjpeg]

Vienna, Austria 2024 © Christian Baumgarten

[ra1nb0wdr3amscap3]

Prater, Austria [Please do not repost my photos!] 

[draganadimitrijevic]

Things can only get better Vienna © Dragana Dimitrijević

[ayshahutton]

Vienna (2019)

Part 5: Prater

[eopederson]

Seattle Great Wheel, 2024.

A large ferris wheel has become something of an urban cliche. Originally developed as an amusement ride for the World's Columbian Exhibition in 1890's Chicago, for almost a century the large wheels were limited to a few fairs and amusement parks. The largest of the old ones still operating is the Wiener Riesenrad at the Prater, famed for its role in "The Third Man," a classic film noir.

Several large wheels were built in Japan just before the millennium, but that year saw the opening of the most famous of the new ones, the London Eye cantilevered over the Thames, an example of audacious engineering. Now large wheels are to be found in a many cities in the US and elsewhere. Some of them, like the London Eye, make sense as both sightseeing and entertainment with expansive views over a mostly low-rise urban landscape. The Seattle wheel offers little such enticement. On the waterfront near sea level, at 53.3 m it is dwarfed by the hills on which the city is constructed as well as by the motley assortment of high rises in the nearby Central Business District. For sightseeing it is all but worthless. Much better overviews of the city can be gotten at various places on land or from the Space Needle and a few of the high rises with upper decks open to the public. I guess it does offer a small thrill as part of the ride is over the water of Elliott Bay. Recommendation to tourists -- save your $20 and walk up Pike Street just across I- 5 to Plymouth Pillars Park, a free viewpoint of the CBD.

[fettesans]

Left, screen captures from Muscle, directed by Hisayasu Satô, 1989. Via. Right, photograph by Herbert List, Hands, violin, and bow of the king of waltz, Johann Strauss. From the series Panoptikum, Vienna, 1944.

While Signal, the dominant propaganda magazine of the Third Reich, focussed on delivering the Nazi ideological message, Tele turned to the cultural life of Europe. It was a magazine that would “employ softer tones… to promote sympathy for Germany,” that would show a selective appreciation of history, culture, and art. 

It was a magazine that showed Germans in a flattering light, as people who appreciated music, art, and the finer things in life, people who, before the war, you might have sat next to during an orchestral performance, people whose not-so-hidden message was, ‘Perhaps we will one day do the same once all this nonsense is finished.’ The editorial policy of the magazine can be summed up as, ‘Let’s not talk about the war.’ Indeed, a picture from the magazine’s penultimate issue was captioned, ‘Let’s just not talk politics.’

That was how, early in 1944, List came to travel to Vienna to meet up with the editors of Tele (who had moved from Berlin due to ongoing air raids), says Richter. “There, he fell in love with the Panoptikum, and suggested that he wanted to do a photo essay on it.”

A waxworks museum in Vienna’s Prater Amusement Park, the Panoptikum was founded by Hermann Präuscher in the 19th century, and showed a variety of waxworks in a lurid mix of fame, horror, sex, murder and anatomical detail in equal measure. 

List had photographed waxworks and catacombs earlier in his career. He had a surrealist fascination for the way the dead eyes and glossy skin of the waxworks were offset by their expressive faces and lifelike poses. Like photography itself, these figures had a surface you couldn’t quite get to grips with, and hidden depths which aroused a sense of unease and the uncanny in the viewer. They existed in a half-world between life and artifice, between fantasy and reality.

Colin Pantall, from Herbert List’s Panoptikum - Colin Pantall speaks to Peer-Olaf Richter, Director of the Herbert List Estate, about the strange and surreal "Panoptikum," a photobook that was first conceived in Vienna in 1944, and published 79 years later, in Magnum, September 29, 2023.

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(...) the dream experience cannot be isolated from its content. Not because it may uncover secret inclinations, inadmissible desires, nor because it may release the whole flock of instincts, nor because it might, like Kant’s God, 'sound our hearts'; but because it restores the movement of freedom in its authentic meaning, showing how it establishes itself or alienates itself, how it constitutes itself as radical responsibility in the world, or how it forgets and abandons itself to its plunge into causality. The dream is that absolute exposure of the ethical content, the heart shown naked.

Michel Foucault, from Dream, Imagination, and Existence, 1954. In his first published text, Foucault discusses the subject matter of Traum und Existenz (Dream and Existence) by Ludwig Binswanger, 1930. Via.

[katarinamiljkovic66]

~ Trip to Vienna ~

🍦 Activity title: Trip to Vienna

🍦 Duration and amount: 26-28th of July, 3 days

🍦 Type of activity: activity

~ Activity Description ~

My partner and I went to Vienna for our one-year anniversary. The reason why we chose Vienna is because I've never been to Vienna myself while my partner has family there that he wished to visit, but also because he has been to Vienna more than once, which means that we wouldn't have too much trouble navigating ourselves in this city.

We first went to see Schloss Belvedere, which was constructed in the early 18th century, and it is even more beautiful in person. The gates had these gorgeous intricate designs, with each one connecting to another. It was very crowded in front of them due to everyone wishing to take a picture of such a piece of art. 

We then headed to the city's center to find something to eat. Unfortunately, most food places were closed, and the place that caught our attention was closed until 1:30pm. We decided to just wait for the restaurant to open and go shopping in the meantime. We were looking at clothes but also at souvenirs to bring home. Despite not getting much, we had a lot of fun just looking around at all the different things the shops had to offer. We also visited Stephansdom and saw Hofburg. The Italian place we got to eat at was great and perfect since pizza is our favorite food. 

Afterwards, we visited his family and had dinner with them. We were quick to finish our meals because we had made a reservation at a restaurant where we would have some drinks and dessert. This restaurant was unique because it had a 360-degree view of the city, which is, other than the positive reviews, the reason we chose that one. We ended up running a bit late, but thankfully our seat by the window had been free. The view from up there was gorgeous due to the lights that decorated the whole city at night. 

To finish off this eventful day, after leaving the restaurant, we went to Wiener Prater, which is one of the oldest amusement parks in Vienna. We went on the Wiener Riesenrad built in 1897, making it one of the oldest Ferris wheels in the world. Despite my fear of heights, I thought of it as a great way to end the night and a unique opportunity to do something I've never done before. It was very fun and totally worth it!

~ Reflection ~

All in all, this trip was probably the best trip of my life, and the days we spent there were wonderful and so fun. Each moment was amazing, and despite a few problems here and there, I wouldn't change this experience for the world❤️

~ Learning Outcomes ~

🍦 Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth

🍦 Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the  process

🍦 Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience

🍦 Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences

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Wild Mouse · Prater Vienna 2023