
Eric Zeisl. Vienna’s Lost Son in Foreign Lands
May – December 2025
Born in Leopoldstadt in 1905, Erich Zeisl was admitted to the former Academy of Music and Performing Arts Vienna (today’s mdw) in 1920/21. The mdw’s Exilarte Center recently received his entire musical estate as well as over 5,000 letters from and to Zeisl. It is therefore an important concern to honor this composer, who had such close ties to Vienna and died in Los Angeles, with an exhibition. Zeisl’s exile in Paris, New York and Los Angeles form the stations of the narrative line. In connection with the expulsion, the exhibition deals with the significant field of “Jewish art music” and spans a dramaturgical contour from the unexpected death of this “Urwiener” in a foreign country to his former home of Vienna, which he never saw again.

Triangle of the Viennese Tradition
Schönberg – Zemlinsky – Hoffmann
March – December 2024
Inspired by Arnold Schönberg’s 150th birthday, celebrated around the world, the new exhibition at the mdw’s Exilarte Center sheds light on the social and cultural environment of the founder of the Second Viennese School. In particular, attention is paid to Alexander von Zemlinsky, who taught Schönberg and introduced him to the Viennese music circles, and to Richard Hoffmann, who was a pupil of Schönberg and later became his assistant.

Fritz Kreisler
Fritz Kreisler – A Cosmopolitan in Exile. From Child Prodigy to “King of Violinists”
September 2022 – May 2023
Due to his Jewish origins, the Vienna-born violin virtuoso Fritz Kreisler was boycotted by the National Socialists and his compositions were banned from the stage. In September 1939 Kreisler immigrated to the USA, where he settled in New York together with his wife Harriet.

Eggerth and Kiepura
My Song For You – Marta Eggerth and Jan Kiepura Between Two Worlds
October 2020 – May 2022
Now as Virtual Reality 360° Tour
The dream couple in film, opera and operetta – after the “Anschluss” in 1938, they were forced to turn their backs on Austria and emigrated to the USA.

Presentation of the Exilarte Estates
2018 – 2024
In the context of this exhibition, twelve estates preserved in the archives of the Exilarte Center were presented.

“I return to Vienna when I compose”
May 2017 to June 2020,
now permanent exhibition – Exilarte Center entrance
The first exhibition opening the newly founded Exilarte Center at the mdw is devoted to the lost musical legacies and the fates of the many musicians prosecuted by the Nazis.

The Emmy und Egon Wellesz Piano
Permanent Exhibition
Room A0103
The story of Emmy and Egon Wellesz´s piano can be experienced at the Exilarte Center.

Erwin Piscator and Maria Ley- Piscator
Political Theater in Exile
May 2019 – June 2020
„Piscator is the greatest theater man of all time. He will leave a legacy that we should use” (Bertolt Brecht)

“The word expired when that world awoke”
Special exhibition on the commemorative years 1918, 1933, 1938
May 2018 – June 2020
2018 brings a number of anniversaries that are themselves symbolic of the shifting nature of the passing age.