Museum Arbeitswelt Steyr

Steyr’s Museum of the Working World (Museum Arbeitswelt Steyr) investigates changes in living and working conditions since industrialization.In 2019, the museum was awarded the Austrian Museum Prize.

The Museum Arbeitswelt am Steyrer Wehrgraben is situated in reconstructed mid-nineteenth-century manufacturing facilities on the banks of the Steyr River.It first appeared in 1987 as part of the Upper Austrian state exhibition “Work, Man, Machine: The Road to Industrial Society.”The concept for this sort of museum was inspired by the industrial museums that sprang up in England at the end of the 1970s.The museum was built as an internationally recognized cultural and event center with extensive exhibitions, projects, and events on socially important problems as a result of the success of the inaugural display.The whole display area was devastated by the Steyr floods in 2002, although it was eventually rebuilt.

At the Museum Arbeitswelt, cultural mediation is critical.at addition to the seminars at the different exhibitions, there has been a “Politics Workshop” since 2009.This program offers workshops on topics such as democracy, racism, migration, and participation.In addition to displays and training, the Museum Arbeitswelt often conducts cultural and educational activities.On the one hand, this lecture series sees itself as a critical discussion platform for contemporary social issues, while simultaneously allowing for an in-depth investigation of the exhibition content.

The remembrance tunnel opened in the autumn of 2013.The “Forced Labor and Concentration Camp in Steyr” museum is situated beneath the Lamberg Castle (Lambergstollen) in a former air raid bunker.This mostly covers the years 1938 to 1945, as well as the history of the Steyr resistance and coping with Nazism.The Mauthausen Committee Steyr initiated the project, and the Museum Arbeitswelt is in responsibility of its preservation.