In Barbara Karl, Minister of Defense Klaudia Tanner has appointed not only an internationally experienced museum expert, but also a scientifically well-connected and renowned expert in the field of collections and art history, as well as a sought-after curator at home and abroad, as Head of Collections at the Museum of Military History (HGM).
“With Barbara Karl as an accomplished expert and now as the appointed head of the collection, another important building block has been laid on a successful path to making the Museum of Military History a museum location with international relevance and networking,” says Tanner. HGM Director Georg Hoffmann (-> Director Hoffmann: “Things are looking up at the HGM) also mentioned the international experience of the new head of department and said that he was looking forward to working with Barbara Karl and the new impetus she would bring to the museum.
Karl studied art history in Vienna and Innsbruck before research fellowships took her abroad. She conducted research at the Warburg Institute in London and the Bard Graduate Center in New York, followed by research projects at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa and the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, where she worked on objects from the Islamic world in Vienna’s museum collections. As curator for textiles and carpets at Vienna’s MAK – Museum of Applied Arts/Contemporary Art – Karl was responsible for the collection of textiles and carpets, the depot organization and the department’s exhibitions and research programmes. Born in Graz, she became Director of the Textile Museum St. Gallen in 2017, completed her habilitation at the University of Innsbruck and took over the scientific management of the Ballenberg Open-Air Museum in Switzerland in 2022, where she is currently also Deputy Managing Director.
“As the oldest of Vienna’s major museums, the Museum of Military History can look back on an important history, which is reflected not least in the high-caliber and diverse collection, which has been illuminated from different perspectives over the course of time,” says the new head of the collections department. “As a passionate curator and collection manager, I look forward to working with the HGM team to take a fresh look at the exciting holdings, plan exhibitions, further develop the collections and promote internal and external collaborations, but above all to inspire and enrich the public with knowledge.”
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