Destroyed and rebuilt. 80 years after the bombs

It was exactly 80 years ago to the day that the Vienna State Opera was hit by bombs. Large parts of the building were burnt out and it took 24 hours to extinguish the fire. The stage, workshops and auditorium were destroyed, as were the decoration workshops in the Prater.

The bombing was preceded by the darkest chapter in the history of the building between 1938 and 1945. Immediately after the "Anschluss", the barbarism of the Nazi regime had also fully arrived at Haus am Ring. Distressingly meticulous lists of those employees were published who were to be immediately suspended, dismissed or sent into forced retirement - from the orchestra, choir, ensemble, operations and administration. All of this was planned well in advance; the illegal National Socialist company cell organizations had already done the groundwork before the Anschluss.

Jewish, "Jewish-inclined" - as the Nazi ideologues put it - and politically dissident employees were persecuted, marginalized, expelled and murdered, artists were no longer allowed to perform and works by Jewish composers had to be silenced. On higher orders, operas such as Königsballade by the National Socialist glorifier Rudolf Wille were now performed - but no one wanted to hear the work: due to a lack of audience interest, there were ultimately only four performances. The performances continued, artistically limited, as the State Opera now had the main function of distracting the population. 1945 was the end - but the last performance was not Wagner's Götterdämmerung, as legend often has it, but Friedrich von Flotow's Martha on January 5, 1945.

This was followed by its destruction on March 12. But just under two months later, immediately after the liberation of Vienna, they wanted to play again. So they hurried to make an emergency artistic operation possible: In the Volksoper, the State Opera - supported by the Soviets - performed Mozart's Marriage of Figaro again on May 1, 1945; on May 24, 1945, State Secretary Julius Raab announced the reconstruction of the destroyed house on the Ring; on October 6, 1945, the hastily restored Theater an der Wien was opened as a second alternative venue. The Vienna State Opera was to perform in these two buildings for the next ten years.

Meanwhile, the house on the Ring was rebuilt. The parties of the provisional government in 1945, consisting of the ÖVP, SPÖ and KPÖ, unanimously supported the reconstruction plan and, contrary to some legends, there was never any question of demolishing the building. Support was also provided by the Allies: financially, with building materials and with technical know-how. What was built on the Ring was a mixture of historicism from 1869 and the style of the 1950s in the interior, an architectural interplay that still gives the building its unique character today.

The ceremonial reopening took place on November 5. After a ceremony in the morning with a lot of politics, Beethoven's Fidelio, the opera par excellence about unjust rule and liberation through love, was performed in the evening. The performance became a symbol of a new Austria. Those who were not there were able to listen in via loudspeakers, 40 radio stations from all over the world broadcast the performance, and at the same time Austrian live television was born: people crowded into halls and inns - because who had a TV set at home in 1955 - to at least be there via television. The allocation of tickets was strictly monitored, a seat cost up to 5,000 schillings, and even politicians and guests of honor were not given free tickets. And if you wanted a (standing) place in the free sale, you had to queue for days.