Program 2024
For three days, journalists will meet other knowledgeable mediators of information from different regions of the world in Innsbruck. In conversations with colleagues and other experts, visitors find out what is going on behind the scenes of the information on international events, which is often hastily and superficially conveyed, and can contribute.
Current social, political and cultural developments are the focus of the debates, from book presentations, exhibitions, doc-films and audio features. The Journalismusfest Innsbruck opens a window to the complex present in which we live.
In 2024, we welcome more than 140 participants from 20 countries and three continents to ~60 events at 25 locations in Innsbruck.
Overview
Prelude
Friday
Saturday
Sunday
Films
Exhibitions
Audio Cinema
Prelude
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival, we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Saturday, 4th May at 8:15pm in Cinematograph.
Friday
Opening and Presentation by Claudia Reiterer. omen represent 80 percent of people affected by hate speech on the net. Once they have attained a certain level of recognition, they are even more likely to become targets. Comments often strike below the belt, address their look and sexualise them, instead of providing a content-based discussion about their arguments. Journalists thus have to manoeuvre through a special field of tension; because due to their media presence, the broad public will often perceive them in a greatly empowered role. Readers do not experience them as victims and are less likely to intervene.
- With Alexander Van der Bellen (video message), Arno Kompatscher, René Zumtobel, Mayor of the City of Innsbruck (enquired), Barbara Plattner, Uwe Steger, Claudia Reiterer
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan and creator of Excel lists. There is however a second passion that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he has created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibition for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothes pegs for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
Since the start of the #MeToo movement in October 2017, also in the German-speaking area, numerous cases of sexualised violence and abuse of power have become known. Just like in the case of Harvey Weinstein, it is often journalists who disclose these cases to the public after their thorough research. What does pretrial publicity entail? Why is #MeToo coverage so controversial from a legal point of view? What are the special challenges of an investigation in our own industry?
- With Laurin Lorenz, Salome Müller, Julia Schafferhofer
Diverse opinions, critical topics, and fundamentally different perspectives: This is what media that wants to establish themselves as an alternative player using their own journalistic concepts, business models and methods stands for. In Tyrol, there are some important alternative media outlets with a consistent, perhaps even traditional, output – in spite of persisting precarious conditions. In the mix, we have aep informationen, founded over 50 years ago, street paper Straßenzeitung 20er, founded over 25 years ago, and the Innsbruck cult magazine UND, founded in 2015. In the more recent past, the term alternative media has predominantly been used to label populist and extremely biased platforms that developed as their own, digital-minded subculture. This round of talks is led and organised by students from the MA programme for Media Studies at the University of Innsbruck and provides an opportunity for regional media professionals to discuss what the term “alternative” means today and what challenges and opportunities alternative print journalism faces.
- With Rebecca Sandbichler, Elisabeth Grabner-Niel, Lukas Ladner, Daniel Pfurtscheller, Students of the MA programme for Media Studies
Access to reliable journalistic information in the vicinity of one’s own reality of life is of paramount importance. On the one hand, our everyday world has grown more prone to the consequences of economic and political links in the globalised world – as seen with Covid-19 and the ramifications of the climate crisis. On the other hand, regional economic, political, cultural and social developments continue to shape our environment. Regional quality coverage is therefore essential in order to impart information about such developments. At the same time it is increasingly met with its own challenges. Editorial regional journalism too must face a rapidly changing media landscape and altered user behaviour. The increasingly connected – multilingual – Euroregion Tyrol – South Tyrol – Trentino invites us to a comparison of regional (media) realities and to a discussion about common challenges.
- With Simone Casalini, Toni Ebner, Christoph Franceschini, Esther Mitterstieler, Hannes Senfter, Marco Witting, Lisa Maria Gasser
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 2:00pm – 3:30pm
- Exhibition opening with guided tour in the inner courtyard of the Faculty of Catholic Theology, afterwards in the Cultural Bakehouse Bäckerei. Conversation as part of the opening.
In Mexico, thousands of people are disappearing on their way to the US. Their relatives embark on a relentless search to find them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus, Barbara Bachmann
On January 10th 2024, a release shook Germany to the core. In their research labelled “Geheimplan” (Secret Plan), Correctiv published information about a meeting of high-ranking AfD politicians, neo-Nazis and well-financed entrepreneurs that took place in November 2023 in Potsdam, Germany. Content of this meeting: planning the displacement of millions of people from Germany. Following the release, nationwide demonstrations against the political right have taken place. Also in Austria, the new right scene, adherents of the Identitarian movement and their political connections with the Austrian FPÖ have been investigated for decades. Journalists remain firm in following these stories with their thorough research; and time and time again, they make a contribution to reveal right-wing structures. On this panel, we shed light on the challenges surrounding investigating the right fringe and the risks they might entail from different angles.
- With Nina Horaczek, Jean Peters, Georg Löwisch
Numerous scientists agree: Combined with the extinction of species, climate change is the biggest and most pressing crisis of the century. But does media coverage live up to its scale? How to report without triggering fatalism or resignation? And how to tackle this topic beyond the borders of departments?
This workshop aims to brush up scientific foundations of the climate crisis and to learn explanatory approaches from the realm of Psychology and Communication Studies that expose why the scale of this subject contradicts media logics.
- With Katharina Kropshofer
The network for climate journalism Netzwerk Klimajournalismus is a cross-media initiative. Its aim is to serve as a hub for journalists and media professionals who (intend to) work on topics surrounding the climate and ecological crisis. This event provides an opportunity for people interested to learn more about the way the network operates, to engage in conversation, and to network.
- With Katharina Kropshofer
The whistleblower hands over the secret data to the reporter whilst dusk shrouds the alley in darkness just like the hood that blankets his face. Investigative research makes us imagine quite adventurous scenes. But do these actually reflect reality? Also the #RotenbergFiles began with leaked information and were then published by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) in German magazine Spiegel, Austrian daily newspaper Standard, German public-service broadcaster ZDF and Swiss Tamedia Gruppe: We are talking 50,000 documents from the environment of oligarch brothers and Putin confidants Arkadi and Boris Rotenberg. For the first time, they show in detail how both of them managed to protect and conceal their wealth from sanctions – also in Kitzbühel. Antonio Baquero, Timo Schober and Maria Retter will tell the adventurous story behind this research and how investigative research of such scale is actually conducted: How do you track down concealed assets? Why are such disclosures important? Why do people hide their assets in Austria and who are their accessories?
- With Antonio Baquero, Maria Retter, Timo Schober
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 3:00pm – 3:45pm
- Exhibition Opening
The planet is at its limits, new viruses temporarily paralyse entire countries and the divide between rich and poor is growing. In 2003, Le Monde diplomatique published the first Atlas of Globalisation. It set the bar for journalistic cartography. A comprehensive and vivid collection containing over 200 innovative graphics shows what globalisation stands for in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, for social progress and international communication from San Francisco to Kinshasa.
Eight editions and over 20 years later, this small exhibition is based on the current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) and showcases different types of graphics in their up-to-date version. This exhibition was created for Journalismusfest 2023 and in collaboration with Le Monde diplomatique / Berlin. This year it will open its doors as an extended version.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
As football mania reaches its fever peak in the run up to the European Football Championships and important national and international elections, we put forth the question: Can sports change our society? Learn how athletes can impact the realm of politics and society and join us on our quest to discover positive and negative examples. Are athletes obliged to act like role models and to be politically active or can they simply practice their sport? To what extent can sports act like a game changer?
- With Toni Innauer, Nicole Selmer, Nicola Werdenigg, Philip Bauer, Rainer Schüller
Designing a magazine refers to a highly fascinating field of visual design remaining stunningly vivid even in the digital era. Swiss-based magazine Reportagen does not advocate for quick coverage but for journalistic craft and compelling stories. The magazine spares photos completely. Zurich-based design studio Moiré established a strong brand providing an independent reading experience for this purpose. Illustrations, infographics and a custom-designed font for Reportagen add to and complete the magazine’s texts and underlying concept: Creating tension, diving into detail, maintaining the reader’s attention and shining a light on the sideshow. In 2013, the project was awarded the Design Prize Switzerland. Marc Kappeler from Moiré speaks about the magazine’s development and other projects that his design studio works on.
- With Marc Kappeler, Daniel Puntas Bernat, Nicola Weber
In 2008, Ecuador recognised the rights of Mother Nature “Pachamama” in its constitution. In 2017, New Zealand’s parliament attributed to the Whanganui River the rights of ownership of its fish, plants, water and ground. Nature is no longer just surrounding us, nature is now with us. Ecosystems can become legal entities and they will claim their due: Ecocide as a criminal offence. We can observe the same steps being taken in Columbia, Bolivia, Spain and Ireland. At some point in the future, we will not be able anymore to take advantage of our planet’s buffet of raw materials. At eye level with flora and fauna: What does this mean for biodiversity, for our lifestyle, for our looting growth-driven economy? For our role in this world in the light of a fundamental change of paradigm?
- With Claus Biegert, Christine von Weizsäcker, Tilo Wesche, Biancka Arruda Miranda
SLAPPs – strategic and abusive lawsuits aiming at intimidating and halting critical coverage or activities by environmental or human rights NGOs. SLAPP stands for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation. Sometimes, their aim is not even to succeed in court. Rather, their purpose is to prohibit critical public participation, one of the building blocks of democracy. Behind the suing parties, we often see financially powerful companies, lobby groups or political parties and organisations who have more money on their side than the defendants—so much more that they can put up with losing the case. The lawsuit, or just threatening to file one, aims at intimidating the other party. After abundant political efforts at European level, in spring 2024, the EU adopted a directive to protect people affected. Its implementation requires action by the individual member states.
- With Caterina D’Osualdo, Walter Strobl, Philipp Wissing, Maria Windhager, Daniela Kraus
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 4:30pm – 6:00pm
- Talk
Time and again, headlines bring attention to violence committed by police officers. In 2022, only in Austria, over 300 suspected cases of excessive police violence were registered. They report of racist attacks, radical right-wing chat groups and violent actions against climate protesters. An esprit of corps within those groups often hinders mutual control. On the one hand, people affected therefore have hardly any chance to have their cases independently resolved; and on the other hand, colleagues slowly undermine the reputation of good police officers. What change do we need to see?
- With Hannah Espín Grau, Colette Schmidt, Christina Zühlke
- Friday, 3rd March 2024
- 5:30pm – 6:30pm
- Guided tour
Karl Kraus (1874-1936), the great Austrian writer, satirist, language and media critic, published The Last Days of Mankind (1918), which is now considered world literature, and had a substantial influence on the public realm working as an editor of the newspaper Die Fackel (The Torch) (1898-1936) for decades: On the occasion of his 150th birthday, this guided tour pays tribute to him.
- With Ulrike Tanzer, Markus Ender
- Please register at sekretariat-brenner-archiv@uibk.ac.at
Climate change and globalisation are driving the spread of new and known pathogens on a global scale. Diseases like malaria, dengue fever, leishmaniosis have become prevalent in Europe too. This keeps producing new challenges for infectiologists. From a healthcare policy perspective, there is an international question regarding the global distribution justice of vaccines and medications. Whether it is the plague, flu pandemics, or Covid-19, pandemics all share one common denominator: they change societies.
- With Marcus Bachmann, Alexander Herbig, Günter Weiss, Elke Ziegler
Dealing with the enduring Russian aggression against Ukraine and the subsequent invasion poses a substantial challenge for media and culture professionals. Both document war events, want to incite reflection and inspire to take individual action.
Documentary films represent a potent genre in order to capture the complexity of the war in Ukraine and to convey the humanity of the people affected. It facilitates a record of the cruelty of war, whilst still pointing out the power of resilience and hope of people.
This panel will discuss the challenges of documentary films about Ukraine and the culture of remembrance of the Soviet occupation in the Baltics by referring to occupation museums as cultural institutions. With the visual input of photos and videos, this debate will also shed light on the post-colonial heritage in Eastern Europe and the ongoing ramifications of Russian imperialism and colonialism on politics in this region.
- With Deniss Hanovs, Inga Pylypchuk, Tigran Petrosyan
In Angola, Gabriele Riedle encounters two Queens, meets militia members (former criminals) in a slum that is closed down on a regular basis, and feels a well-known Angolan journalist’s frustration of rooted in the whiteworld’s lack of interest in Africa. Unlike most reporters today, Riedle does not write in the present tense, which conveys a sense of immediacy—but rather in the “literary” past tense. She composes her sentences just like music; because she is convinced that documenting “what is” is impossible, and that each report makes a conscious or unconscious allusion to narrative traditions such as adventure novels. To her current book, a poetic novel about the work of war reporters, she even adds the subtitle “Eine Art Abenteuerroman” (A Type of an Adventure Novel).
- With Gabriele Riedle, Daniel Puntas Bernet
After its premiere at the 2023 edition of Journalismusfest, Germany’s most entertaining stage performance for journalists is back in Austria. The Reporter Slam entails five journalists reporting from their investigations in a varied manner. But there is only one who can become slampion of the night. Who? Our audience will decide. Our guests cover the entire German-speaking area – Germany, Austria, Switzerland, South Tyrol and Luxembourg – ensuring an exhilarating but informative opportunity to round off the night. The winner of the night will be able to participate in the Berlin yearly finale.
- With Dennis Frasch, Hasnain Kazim, Teseo La Marca, Nina Lamparski, Anja Reiter, Jochen Markett, E43
- Friday, 3rd March 2024
- 8:00pm – 9:00pm
- Talk
The fact that he knew the Tyrolean State Anthem off by heart, a song that pays tribute to the heroic death of freedom fighter Andreas Hofer, could have been interpreted as outstanding ambition. And it goes without saying that he mastered the Tyrolean dialect too, he grew up in Tyrol after all. But Emran Feroz, born in Innsbruck, describes that all of this was not enough in order to be perceived as a Tyrolean. In the late 1970s, his father made his way from Kabul to Europe by bus, where he wanted to study. And since his home country was subsequently invaded by the Soviets, he did not want to go back there. Years later, Emran Feroz visited his father’s homeland as a journalist and human rights activist; because he wanted to better understand the situation in Afghanistan. Since the Taliban seized power in 2021, he has been a popular expert on an international level. After his book “Der längste Krieg. 20 Jahre War on Terror” (The Longest War. 20 Years of War on Terror) he has now published his autobiography: “Vom Westen nichts Neues. Ein muslimisches Leben zwischen Alpen und Hindukusch“ (All Quiet in the West. Muslim Lifestyle between Alps and Hindu Kush).
- With Renata Schmidtkunz, Emran Feroz
- Please register via telephone 0512/5343-26220 or at this link.
Jamaram, who have been considered as the unsinkable eight of reggae ever since their foundation at the turn of the millennium, is far from done! The band stands for peace, cosmopolitanism, and respect; but also against war, intolerance, and isolation. Join Jamaram and Jahcoustix in the fight against the decline of clubs and festivals, against courtship through the phone and couch potatoes with junk and schnaps and Netflix. It´s a massive workout for the legs and sweating is guaranteed!
- Admission: 20€ pre-sale until May 5th, 25€ at box office
Saturday
Have you always wanted to know how the main editorial office of Austrian daily newspaper Standard makes their decisions, what kind of coffee supports this process and why certain topics make it to the cover? The newspaper breakfast is here to give you a sneak peak into the press review conducted by Daniela Kraus and the entire deputy chief editorship. They will also have a look at other newspapers and discuss Rainer Schüller’s favourite type of cake. And you, the audience, will have the opportunity to ask your burning questions.
- With Rainer Schüller, Nana Siebert, Petra Stuiber, Daniela Kraus
Can a constructive and solution-oriented form of journalism be the solution for the increasing media apathy? This approach has big potential, that is for sure: Casting a differentiated view on different solution approaches and successful concepts, constructive journalism can open new perspectives and strengthen the understanding for complexity and ambiguity. But if nobody wants to click on good news, how can constructive and solution-oriented journalism win a majority appeal? Or is there a constructive way of dealing with crises? The panellists report from their practical experience as editor, founder and coach. They address examples of constructive journalism and its advantages.
- With Lucie Černá, Ellen Heinrichs, Nina Schnider, Julia Breitkopf
A Ukrainian journalist team from the Associated Press (AP) documents the atrocities committed by the Russian invasion forces in Mariupol despite the siege. As the only reporters on the ground, they capture crucial images of the war, including the suffering of the civilian population, mass graves and the bombing of a maternity clinic. The documentary film by Pulitzer Prize winner Mstyslav Chernov also shows the effects of the Russia-Ukraine war on the AP press agency. The film is based on Chernov’s daily reports and his own footage from the war zone. This multi-award-winning documentary provides harrowing insights into the suffering of civilians under siege. Despite the gravity of the topic, it takes an invaluable look at the challenges of news journalism in conflict zones and also shows the global impact.
- With Eva Binder
- Admission fee of 7€; free admission for students
A call for more solidarity, unity and activism: Since 2018, visual Artist Katharina Cibulka and her team have been installing hand-embroidered scaffold nets on well-visited, prominent construction sites and inspiring discourse among passers-by with socio-political messages. One sentence starting with “So Long as” and ending in “I Am a Feminist” points at existing inequalities. („Let’s Go Equal. The Solange Project“, published by Hirmer-Verlag, 2024)
During their conversation, Katharina Cibulka and her colleague Tina Themel will illustrate their artistic approach. After that, visitors can visit “arttirol 10”, the presentation of art acquisitions of the Federal State of Tyrol between 2021 and 2023. This also includes a relict (Net no. 5) of the “Wrapping of the Innsbruck Cathedral” by Katharina Cibulka.
- With Katharina Cibulka, Tina Themel, Gerlinde Tamerl
Populist media often provide simplistic solutions for complex problems and issues. For platforms containing such contents it is common to refer to terms like “exchange of populations” and “waves of refugees”. Such vocabulary suggests doomsday images in Europe. What is the purpose of these metaphors and terms like “remigration”? How come that they manage to establish themselves so quickly in our society? We would like to discuss this question in an interactive format, that will also involve the audience’s participation.
- With Daniela Ingruber, Hasnain Kazim, Dajana Mehadžić
Why should I even consider becoming a journalist? Elitist, yet badly paid. Hostilities online and scarce job prospects. Is a journalism career still worthwhile? It is the greatest profession of the world for some after all. How can I get a foothold in the world of media and what are the skills I need to be successful? Students of the German training institution for journalists Deutsche Journalistenschule München present the different training routes to work in an editorial department and give an insight into their own experiences, explaining why it is never too late to start a career in this field.
- With Anna Tratter, Denis Pscheidl
How can you verify whether images show what they claim to be showing? How can an editorial team find out where a video was taken? Whether the footage is recent or years old? There is an increasing need for editorial teams to verify images. Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) is making their lives easier. This term derives from the realm of intelligence services. OSINT journalists use all freely-available online sources: not only photos and videos; but also databases or satellite images. When engaged in open-source investigations, journalists increasingly assume roles similar to those of law enforcement officers. Investigative networks like Bellingcat or Forensic Architecture are specialised in this field. Lea Weinmann, editor of the investigative team of German daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung illustrates this task referring to media coverage from areas torn by war and crises.
- With Lea Weinmann, Birgit Gufler
The 23rd February 2024 was yet another sad low point in Austria’s femicide history: Five women and girls were murdered on a single day due to their gender. A total of 26 femicides were recorded in 2023, making Austria the country with the highest rate of femicides in the EU. For their radio feature, Janina Böck-Koroschitz and Elisabeth Weilenmann met many people who deal with the topic, including the survivor Renate Daurer, the psychiatrist Adelheid Kastner and the doctor Peter Klar, who prevented a femicide. They introduce preventive measures, report about activism and show how moral courage can save lives.
- With Elisabeth Weilenmann, Judith Goetz, Sonja Prieth
In Myanmar, formerly Burma, indications of a positive development have been observed for the first time since the military coup of February 2021. Rebel groups allied with the underground democracy movement engage in nation-wide actions against the military junta. Famous Burmese intellectual, writer, activist and doctor Ma Thida finds the the resistance of the civil society and democratic movement encouraging. The winner of the last elections and Peace Nobel Prize Winner Aun San Suu Kyi was removed by the coup d’état and remains to be incarcerated. A disenchanting situation for media professionals: On the World Press Freedom Index, Myanmar ranks 173th out of 180 states.
Ma Thida too, had been incarcerated for a long time and is now living in exile in Berlin. With journalist and Asia expert Sven Hansen, she discusses the Spring Revolution in Maynmar and how it strives to find a multi-ethnic democratic exit from this labyrinth. International reactions prove to be disappointing.
- With Ma Thida, Sven Hansen
Scientific communication is a broad field, with formats and narrative forms becoming more diverse. Conveying the significance of complex learnings in specialised fields for a broad interested public proves to be an exciting challenge: for journalists as well as for bodies with expertise in imparting information like universities, for influencers on social media and for scientists themselves.
- With Beatrice Lugger, Rudi Nowotny, Amelie Reigl, Uwe Steger, Elke Ziegler, Tanja Traxler
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan of Excel lists,. There is however a second passion, that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibitions for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothespins for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
The Atlas of Globalisation by Le Monde diplomatique has been setting standards in journalistic cartography for 20 years. It represents a comprehensive and clear illustration of what globalisation means in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, and for social progress. The current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) is showcased as part of a collaboration between Journalismusfest with Le Monde Diplomatique / Berlin.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
She was probably the first investigative journalist in the German world. 1923, at the age of 24, Paula Schlier, who had previously published articles against the Nazis as a journalist, sneaked into the party leaflet of the NSDAP, the “Völkischer Beobachter”. Disguised as a secretary she also documented Hitler’s attempted putsch on November 8th/9th 1923. Her diary reports were published in 1926 as a celebrated first work by the Brenner publishing house in Innsbruck: “Petras Aufzeichnungen oder Konzept einer Jugend nach dem Diktat der Zeit” (Petra’s Records or the Concept of Youth under the Dictate of Time) was a statement against a world that was radicalising to the right. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Hitler putsch, Innsbruck-based Germanists Annette Steinsiek and Ursula A. Schneider have published a commentary on Paula Schlier’s report. Based on that, the Bavarian Broadcasting (BR) has produced the documentation “Hitlerputsch 1923. The Diary of Paula Schlier”.
- With Annette Steinsiek, Ursula A. Schneider, Joachim Leitner
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
On October 3rd 2013, a boat sinks off the coast of Lampedusa. More than 300 people die and the then mayor Giusi Nicolini knows: something needs to happen. A few days later, she holds an impressive speech at the EU summit. In 2015, one year after the discontinuation of the Italian state-run rescue operation Mare Nostrum, the organisation for the rescue of life at sea SOS Méditerranée was founded. Since then, it saved 38,500 lives and was awarded the Right Livelihood Award in 2023 for its operation. By now, civil-operated sea rescue has become a difficult undertaking. Europe is closing down its external borders, at times, resorting to violence. Time and time again, we see reports about EU Border Guard Agency Frontex being involved in pushbacks of migrants on the Greek coast.
- With Giorgos Christides, Fyras Mawazini, Giusi Nicolini, Christian Jakob
At a gig in the autumn of 2023, Berlin-based editor for the German weekly newspaper ZEIT Lenz Jacobsen spoke about Austria and Switzerland: “(Sounds like) beautiful countries. If that is the case: Why the hell are we sitting in a grey fairground hall instead of in the Alpine idyll?” This is why the third gig of the three ZEIT editors at Journalismusfest Innsbruck will take place against a unique backdrop for the first time – live at Seegrube cable car station above Innsbruck. Just like every week, the journalists from Innsbruck / Vienna, Zurich, and Berlin will discuss current affairs in their podcast. This time, in the midst of an Alpine idyll.
- With Matthias Daum, Florian Gasser, Lenz Jacobson
- Saturday, 4th May 2024
- 3:00pm – 4:30pm
- Talk
Following the Hamas massacre on October 7th 2023, war in Israel and Palestine has erupted once more and has also been dominating German speaking media. For the Palestinian and Israeli-Jewish diaspora the war is closer than just an image on the news: They are worried about relatives and friends and facing hostilities and a tense discourse themselves. Jewish Israelis and Palestinians sharing a panel has become an exception by now. Alena Jabarine and Tomer Dotan-Dreyfus will do just that. With Bascha Mika they will talk about their view on the conflict, being seen and being ignored, and the debate in the German-speaking world.
- With Alena Jabarine, Tomer Dotan-Dreyfus, Bascha Mika
In November 2022 shocking allegations were made about German oil company Wintershall Dea. German media alleged links between Wintershall and the Russian military, claiming that companies owned jointly by Wintershall and Russian state-owned gas company Gazprom had been drilling for gas in western Siberia and produced fuel used by Russian fighter jets as they attacked Ukrainian civilians.
Wintershall denied these accusations, claiming a lack of evidence. But in April 2023, an investigation led by Global Witness revealed new evidence of the supply chains connecting Wintershall’s Siberian gas fields to Russia’s military supply chains, showing how gas condensate from Wintershall’s fields in Western Siberia feed a refinery which sends diesel to Russian military suppliers.
This short film looks at the human stories behind our investigation. Filmed largely in Ukraine, it includes powerful testimonies from survivors of Russian air attacks. It asks the question: whilst western governments decry the war in Ukraine, how has this been allowed to happen?
- With Pavle Popovic, Emma Strauss, Michael Hornsby
- Free admission.
The Mediterranean region is a hotspot in which crises and challenges overlap. The sea is warming up more than the global average, the ecosystem is being severely affected by oil and gas extraction, climate change is having a socio-economic impact on coastal areas and large-scale fishing is robbing traditional fisheries of their livelihoods. But there are also pioneers of sustainability and there is a great deal of commitment to rescuing refugees.
The journalist Stefano Liberti and the photographer Francesco Bellina are travelling throughout the Mediterranean for a large documentary project: The research trip leads them to Murcia and Favignana off Sicily, to Tanger and the Kerkennah Islands off Tunisia, to the Nile Delta and the Suez Canal, to Cyprus, to the islands of Antikythera and Jabuka, all the way to Venice.
- With Francesco Bellina, Stefano Liberti, Benedikt Sauer
- Saturday, 4th May 2024
- 5:00pm – 6:30pm
- Talk
Ever since Victor Orbán has been in power in Hungary, the media has gradually been taken under the control of the government. In Reporters Without Borders’ ranking of press freedom, Hungary comes last in the EU. The weekly newspaper HVG remains one of the last independent newspapers and its editor-in-chief is a guest at the Journalismusfest.
Large foundations have recently become involved in Eastern European countries in order to preserve the remaining media diversity and thus strengthen democracies. In 2021, the Dutch Plūrālis Foundation was founded with the aim of investing specifically in Eastern European media. The Austrian ERSTE Foundation is also invested in Plūrālis.
- With Márton Gergely, Maribel Königer, Nina Horaczek
Documentary filmmaker Gianfranco Rosi spent over a year on the Italian island of Lampedusa, observing how refugees arrive here every day in the hope of a better life and how the people react towards them. Twelve-year-old Samuele, who witnesses a great human tragedy with his family, is at the centre of the film, which also deals with media coverage. Through his everyday observations, Gianfranco Rosi approaches a place that is as real as it is symbolic as well as the emotional world of some of its inhabitants, who are exposed to a permanent state of emergency. And at the same time, the film, which does not need a narration, describes how even in the smallest of spaces, two worlds barely touch.
- With Giusi Nicolini
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
In light of the massive environmental destruction that is now affecting the entire planet and challenging human existence, a question urgently arises: Is the human being a Homo destructor who destroys its environment always and everywhere? Or do we have a destructive side that only becomes visible under certain circumstances? Do humans only turn into Homo destructor at a certain point in time?
The well-known geographer and doyen of Alpine research Werner Bätzing gets to the bottom of these questions in a comprehensive history of man and the environment. Cultural self-limitation in earlier times is called into question by the industrial revolution, modern science, enlightenment and the market economy. This is the beginning of a way of thinking and acting that exploits nature and the environment on a short-term basis and destroys the limited earth. Bätzing pleads in his Opus magnum “Homo destructor” (Beck, 2023) for a new cultural self-limitation.
- With Werner Bätzing, Wolfger Mayrhofer
- Please register at: daniela.greimel@tyrolia.at.
Armin Thurnher, who turned 75 in February, is one of the most sharp-witted analysts in Austria and an excellent essayist. He shaped the public discourse with his analyses of the political situation and the Media landscapes in Austria and Europe. Thurnher is from Bregenz and co-founded the weekly newspaper Falter in 1977. He is its publisher and still one of the two editors-in-chief. In addition, he is the author of 13 books. His most recent publications are the novel “Fähre nach Manhatten”, the political essay “Anstandslos” and “Preis und Klage. Reden und Nachreden in Versen”. Armin Thurnher received numerous prizes and awards. In March 2024 he received the Austrian State Prize for Cultural Journalism.
- With Armin Thurnher, Ivona Jelčić
- Please register at literatur@wagnersche.at.
Eric Frey, editor of Standard, explains in the podcast “Topic of the Day” how explosive the current world situation is. How the war in Ukraine rewrites the world order. What this means for China/Taiwan and North Korea. And how the USA and Europe fall under pressure. He also analyses how the multiple conflicts are connected to each other and if and how a third world war could come about, that has been taking place virtually for a long time already.
- With Eric Frey, Zsolt Wilhelm
“Your arrival in the kitchens of the world was your death sentence”, is how Rocío Puntas Bernet’s report begins, which can be experienced as a staged reading at the Journalismusfest Innsbruck: a report about the coveted bluefin tuna. Within 30 years the former large stocks collapsed. The global boom in sushi has led to massive fishing pressure, particularly in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. In the Turkish part of these seas it is considered extinct. In order to satisfy the global hunger for sushi, the huge animals are fattened in large numbers in the Mediterranean.
A story about the legal grey areas in the food industry and an ode to tuna. The Bühnen Bern and the journal Reportagen present their original stage format for the first time in Austria.
- With Linus Schütz, Daniel Puntas Bernet, Axel Hein
- Admission: 10€, tickets: www.treibhaus.at
In times of heated information dissemination and opinion-forming, the question arises as to whether other methods of “news” formats are needed to keep attention on topics of long-term explosiveness. Public debates about flight and migration in particular show that these topics are both highly polarizing and important “focal points” of remembrance culture and contemporary history. They also often provide an anchor for long-term civic commitment. How can (auto)biographical narratives help to bear witness to reality and reach a broad public? How can we prevent tragedies from becoming the object of sensationalism? Can we do justice to individuals and are biographical approaches a legitimate means of providing information?
- With Yirgalem Fisseha Mebrahtu, Dr. Grażyna Jurewicz, Magdalena Modler-El Abdaoui
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Thursday, 2nd May at 8:00pm at Waltherpark.
- Admission 7€; free admission for students
The Ensemble Yagódy is one of the most charismatic Ukrainian folk ensembles from Lviv. Founded in the year 2016 at the Theater-Faculty, Yagódy launched their debut album in 2020. The four founding women travelled through several Ukrainian oblasts to track down the musical traditions of the people there. From this inexhaustible number of songs about life, Yagódy create their own exciting and unmistakable sound. The musicians feel at home in the theatre and realize their musical ideas for the stage according to dramaturgical principles. Their songs are love letters from the past, which have not arrived yet.
- Admission: 20€ pre-sale until May 5th, 25€ at box office
Sunday
Matthias Krapf, one of the two editors-in-chief of the daily newspaper Tiroler Tageszeitung, discusses the current Saturday and Sunday editions of Tiroler Tageszeitung with the audience over a cup of coffee at the pastry shop Munding.
- With Matthias Krapf
- Sunday, 5th May 2024
- 10:00am – 11:30am
- Reading and conversation
A photo album with 378 passport photos is found at the flea market: Jacob B’chiri photographed himself every day for a year in a photo booth in various disguises and poses. The first-person narrator now follows his tracks, from Paris to Rome and Marseille, to the cemeteries of Djerba and to the edges of the Israeli desert. In doing so, he explores The Lives of Jacob (Hanser 2023) – “the lives” because this word only exists in plural in Hebrew: a clever novel between literature and journalistic research, about the relationship between photography and identity, about the experience of war and exile, Jewish history, faith and the great tragedies of the 20th century.
- With Christophe Boltanski, Maria Piok
The full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 sparked a major reevaluation of Europe’s business, energy and political ties to Russia, vindicating those investigative journalists who had been raising the alarm about Russia’s corrupting influence in Europe for years. More than two years into the war, which topics are still under-reported, how can journalists approach them, and has the media caught up with the new reality?
Ukrainian and German journalists and civil society experts will share findings from their research and reporting, and discuss what’s next when covering the Kremlin’s influence in Europe.
- With Olesia Horiainova, Tanya Kozyreva, Sebastian Rötters, Mattia Nelles
The Claus Gatterer award for Socially Committed Quality Journalism is named after an excellent journalist, historian, writer and documentary filmmaker. Gatterer, who was born in 1924 in Sexten/South Tyrol, has left many traces: with ground breaking contemporary historical and literary works on Austria, Italy and South Tyrol as well as a journalist in Austria’s media landscape, especially with his socially critical ORF television magazine teleobjektiv. Gatterer’s focus on social and ethnic minorities has shaped a generation of journalists.
What can socially committed journalism mean today?
- With Günther Pallaver, Christoph Franceschini, Edith Meinhart, Ed Moschitz, Rebecca Sandbichler, Daniela Kraus
The streets and roads of Innsbruck belong to all who live here. And yet cars enjoy priority in the public space. The Radlobby Tirol has analysed critical points in the city centre and will explain on the city walk how much space is available for which form of mobility. And we will question if this is really fair. The route is around 1.6 km long and leads to the freight terminal, where the discussion will continue.
- With Josef Scheiring
Bicycles have a hard time not only in public spaces, but also in media coverage. Instead of being seen as part of the solution – for example for traffic, environmental and health problems – it is often presented as a problem. Instead of being recognized as a serious form of mobility, it is dismissed as a toy. How do journalists and experts who have dedicated themselves to the topic deal with this?
- With Josef Scheiring, Stefanie Ruep, Christoph Berger-Schauer, Thomas Pupp, Simon Welebil
In Mexico, thousands of people disappear on their way to the USA, and relatives never stop looking for them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus
In recent years, people like former CIA employee Edward Snowden or Australian investigative journalist Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks, have put their own safety and freedom at risk to enlighten the public by disclosing secret information about state crimes. For this courage, the whistleblower pay a huge price. In exile in Moscow, Snowden is dependent on the benevolence of autocrat Vladimir Putin, while Assange has been imprisoned in the UK for five years and faces life imprisonment if extradited to the USA. Human rights lawyer Robert Tibbo, who arranged Snowden’s escape, and British whistleblower and former ambassador Craig Murray discuss with Ilja Braun from Reporters Without Borders/Germany how to better protect those who bring the truth to light.
- With Ilja Braun, Craig Murray, Robert Tibbo, Emily Busvine
For the second time, the podcast “Inside Austria” by Der Standard and Der Spiegel will be performed live at the Journalismusfest Innsbruck.
- With Robert Treichler, Lucia Heisterkamp, Margit Ehrenhöfer, Katharina Mittelstaedt
Since the attack by Hamas terrorists on October 7, in which around 1,200 mostly Jewish-Israelis were brutally murdered and 253 people were taken hostage, and according to UN figures, more than 30,000 people have died as a result of the ongoing attacks by the Israeli military on the Gaza Strip (March 2024) and many are threatened with starvation, the region has become the focus of global media coverage. However, journalistic work in the war zone in Gaza remains extremely risky: According to the Committee to Protect Journalists at least 95 journalists, mostly Palestinians, have been killed in Gaza since the war started.
How do two journalists from Israel-Palestine, a Jewish-Israeli editor and a Palestinian journalist from Gaza, see the challenges for reporting now in a new time of war? How do they rate the media landscape(s) in the region? What perspectives do they see for the region?
Hanno Loewy, director of the Jewish Museum Hohenems, will lead the dialogue.
- With Tamar Tsvaigrach, Ahmed Alnaouq, Hanno Loewy
Treibhaus and Gemeindemuseum Absam commemorate the sceptical physician and publicist Werner Vogt from Zams in Tyrol, a pioneer of civil society.
Films
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival, we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Saturday, 4th May at 8:15pm in Cinematograph.
A Ukrainian journalist team from the Associated Press (AP) documents the atrocities committed by the Russian invasion forces in Mariupol despite the siege. As the only reporters on the ground, they capture crucial images of the war, including the suffering of the civilian population, mass graves and the bombing of a maternity clinic. The documentary film by Pulitzer Prize winner Mstyslav Chernov also shows the effects of the Russia-Ukraine war on the AP press agency. The film is based on Chernov’s daily reports and his own footage from the war zone. This multi-award-winning documentary provides harrowing insights into the suffering of civilians under siege. Despite the gravity of the topic, it takes an invaluable look at the challenges of news journalism in conflict zones and also shows the global impact.
- With Eva Binder
- Admission fee of 7€; free admission for students
She was probably the first investigative journalist in the German world. 1923, at the age of 24, Paula Schlier, who had previously published articles against the Nazis as a journalist, sneaked into the party leaflet of the NSDAP, the “Völkischer Beobachter”. Disguised as a secretary she also documented Hitler’s attempted putsch on November 8th/9th 1923. Her diary reports were published in 1926 as a celebrated first work by the Brenner publishing house in Innsbruck: “Petras Aufzeichnungen oder Konzept einer Jugend nach dem Diktat der Zeit” (Petra’s Records or the Concept of Youth under the Dictate of Time) was a statement against a world that was radicalising to the right. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Hitler putsch, Innsbruck-based Germanists Annette Steinsiek and Ursula A. Schneider have published a commentary on Paula Schlier’s report. Based on that, the Bavarian Broadcasting (BR) has produced the documentation “Hitlerputsch 1923. The Diary of Paula Schlier”.
- With Annette Steinsiek, Ursula A. Schneider, Joachim Leitner
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
In November 2022 shocking allegations were made about German oil company Wintershall Dea. German media alleged links between Wintershall and the Russian military, claiming that companies owned jointly by Wintershall and Russian state-owned gas company Gazprom had been drilling for gas in western Siberia and produced fuel used by Russian fighter jets as they attacked Ukrainian civilians.
Wintershall denied these accusations, claiming a lack of evidence. But in April 2023, an investigation led by Global Witness revealed new evidence of the supply chains connecting Wintershall’s Siberian gas fields to Russia’s military supply chains, showing how gas condensate from Wintershall’s fields in Western Siberia feed a refinery which sends diesel to Russian military suppliers.
This short film looks at the human stories behind our investigation. Filmed largely in Ukraine, it includes powerful testimonies from survivors of Russian air attacks. It asks the question: whilst western governments decry the war in Ukraine, how has this been allowed to happen?
- With Pavle Popovic, Emma Strauss, Michael Hornsby
- Free admission.
Documentary filmmaker Gianfranco Rosi spent over a year on the Italian island of Lampedusa, observing how refugees arrive here every day in the hope of a better life and how the people react towards them. Twelve-year-old Samuele, who witnesses a great human tragedy with his family, is at the centre of the film, which also deals with media coverage. Through his everyday observations, Gianfranco Rosi approaches a place that is as real as it is symbolic as well as the emotional world of some of its inhabitants, who are exposed to a permanent state of emergency. And at the same time, the film, which does not need a narration, describes how even in the smallest of spaces, two worlds barely touch.
- With Giusi Nicolini
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Thursday, 2nd May at 8:00pm at Waltherpark.
- Admission 7€; free admission for students
Exhibitions
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan and creator of Excel lists. There is however a second passion that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he has created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibition for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothes pegs for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 2:00pm – 3:30pm
- Exhibition opening with guided tour in the inner courtyard of the Faculty of Catholic Theology, afterwards in the Cultural Bakehouse Bäckerei. Conversation as part of the opening.
In Mexico, thousands of people are disappearing on their way to the US. Their relatives embark on a relentless search to find them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus, Barbara Bachmann
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 3:00pm – 3:45pm
- Exhibition Opening
The planet is at its limits, new viruses temporarily paralyse entire countries and the divide between rich and poor is growing. In 2003, Le Monde diplomatique published the first Atlas of Globalisation. It set the bar for journalistic cartography. A comprehensive and vivid collection containing over 200 innovative graphics shows what globalisation stands for in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, for social progress and international communication from San Francisco to Kinshasa.
Eight editions and over 20 years later, this small exhibition is based on the current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) and showcases different types of graphics in their up-to-date version. This exhibition was created for Journalismusfest 2023 and in collaboration with Le Monde diplomatique / Berlin. This year it will open its doors as an extended version.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan of Excel lists,. There is however a second passion, that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibitions for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothespins for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
The Atlas of Globalisation by Le Monde diplomatique has been setting standards in journalistic cartography for 20 years. It represents a comprehensive and clear illustration of what globalisation means in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, and for social progress. The current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) is showcased as part of a collaboration between Journalismusfest with Le Monde Diplomatique / Berlin.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
In Mexico, thousands of people disappear on their way to the USA, and relatives never stop looking for them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus
Audio Cinema
The 23rd February 2024 was yet another sad low point in Austria’s femicide history: Five women and girls were murdered on a single day due to their gender. A total of 26 femicides were recorded in 2023, making Austria the country with the highest rate of femicides in the EU. For their radio feature, Janina Böck-Koroschitz and Elisabeth Weilenmann met many people who deal with the topic, including the survivor Renate Daurer, the psychiatrist Adelheid Kastner and the doctor Peter Klar, who prevented a femicide. They introduce preventive measures, report about activism and show how moral courage can save lives.
- With Elisabeth Weilenmann, Judith Goetz, Sonja Prieth
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival, we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Saturday, 4th May at 8:15pm in Cinematograph.
Opening and Presentation by Claudia Reiterer. omen represent 80 percent of people affected by hate speech on the net. Once they have attained a certain level of recognition, they are even more likely to become targets. Comments often strike below the belt, address their look and sexualise them, instead of providing a content-based discussion about their arguments. Journalists thus have to manoeuvre through a special field of tension; because due to their media presence, the broad public will often perceive them in a greatly empowered role. Readers do not experience them as victims and are less likely to intervene.
- With Alexander Van der Bellen (video message), Arno Kompatscher, René Zumtobel, Mayor of the City of Innsbruck (enquired), Barbara Plattner, Uwe Steger, Claudia Reiterer
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan and creator of Excel lists. There is however a second passion that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he has created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibition for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothes pegs for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
Since the start of the #MeToo movement in October 2017, also in the German-speaking area, numerous cases of sexualised violence and abuse of power have become known. Just like in the case of Harvey Weinstein, it is often journalists who disclose these cases to the public after their thorough research. What does pretrial publicity entail? Why is #MeToo coverage so controversial from a legal point of view? What are the special challenges of an investigation in our own industry?
- With Laurin Lorenz, Salome Müller, Julia Schafferhofer
Diverse opinions, critical topics, and fundamentally different perspectives: This is what media that wants to establish themselves as an alternative player using their own journalistic concepts, business models and methods stands for. In Tyrol, there are some important alternative media outlets with a consistent, perhaps even traditional, output – in spite of persisting precarious conditions. In the mix, we have aep informationen, founded over 50 years ago, street paper Straßenzeitung 20er, founded over 25 years ago, and the Innsbruck cult magazine UND, founded in 2015. In the more recent past, the term alternative media has predominantly been used to label populist and extremely biased platforms that developed as their own, digital-minded subculture. This round of talks is led and organised by students from the MA programme for Media Studies at the University of Innsbruck and provides an opportunity for regional media professionals to discuss what the term “alternative” means today and what challenges and opportunities alternative print journalism faces.
- With Rebecca Sandbichler, Elisabeth Grabner-Niel, Lukas Ladner, Daniel Pfurtscheller, Students of the MA programme for Media Studies
Access to reliable journalistic information in the vicinity of one’s own reality of life is of paramount importance. On the one hand, our everyday world has grown more prone to the consequences of economic and political links in the globalised world – as seen with Covid-19 and the ramifications of the climate crisis. On the other hand, regional economic, political, cultural and social developments continue to shape our environment. Regional quality coverage is therefore essential in order to impart information about such developments. At the same time it is increasingly met with its own challenges. Editorial regional journalism too must face a rapidly changing media landscape and altered user behaviour. The increasingly connected – multilingual – Euroregion Tyrol – South Tyrol – Trentino invites us to a comparison of regional (media) realities and to a discussion about common challenges.
- With Simone Casalini, Toni Ebner, Christoph Franceschini, Esther Mitterstieler, Hannes Senfter, Marco Witting, Lisa Maria Gasser
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 2:00pm – 3:30pm
- Exhibition opening with guided tour in the inner courtyard of the Faculty of Catholic Theology, afterwards in the Cultural Bakehouse Bäckerei. Conversation as part of the opening.
In Mexico, thousands of people are disappearing on their way to the US. Their relatives embark on a relentless search to find them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus, Barbara Bachmann
On January 10th 2024, a release shook Germany to the core. In their research labelled “Geheimplan” (Secret Plan), Correctiv published information about a meeting of high-ranking AfD politicians, neo-Nazis and well-financed entrepreneurs that took place in November 2023 in Potsdam, Germany. Content of this meeting: planning the displacement of millions of people from Germany. Following the release, nationwide demonstrations against the political right have taken place. Also in Austria, the new right scene, adherents of the Identitarian movement and their political connections with the Austrian FPÖ have been investigated for decades. Journalists remain firm in following these stories with their thorough research; and time and time again, they make a contribution to reveal right-wing structures. On this panel, we shed light on the challenges surrounding investigating the right fringe and the risks they might entail from different angles.
- With Nina Horaczek, Jean Peters, Georg Löwisch
Numerous scientists agree: Combined with the extinction of species, climate change is the biggest and most pressing crisis of the century. But does media coverage live up to its scale? How to report without triggering fatalism or resignation? And how to tackle this topic beyond the borders of departments?
This workshop aims to brush up scientific foundations of the climate crisis and to learn explanatory approaches from the realm of Psychology and Communication Studies that expose why the scale of this subject contradicts media logics.
- With Katharina Kropshofer
The network for climate journalism Netzwerk Klimajournalismus is a cross-media initiative. Its aim is to serve as a hub for journalists and media professionals who (intend to) work on topics surrounding the climate and ecological crisis. This event provides an opportunity for people interested to learn more about the way the network operates, to engage in conversation, and to network.
- With Katharina Kropshofer
The whistleblower hands over the secret data to the reporter whilst dusk shrouds the alley in darkness just like the hood that blankets his face. Investigative research makes us imagine quite adventurous scenes. But do these actually reflect reality? Also the #RotenbergFiles began with leaked information and were then published by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) in German magazine Spiegel, Austrian daily newspaper Standard, German public-service broadcaster ZDF and Swiss Tamedia Gruppe: We are talking 50,000 documents from the environment of oligarch brothers and Putin confidants Arkadi and Boris Rotenberg. For the first time, they show in detail how both of them managed to protect and conceal their wealth from sanctions – also in Kitzbühel. Antonio Baquero, Timo Schober and Maria Retter will tell the adventurous story behind this research and how investigative research of such scale is actually conducted: How do you track down concealed assets? Why are such disclosures important? Why do people hide their assets in Austria and who are their accessories?
- With Antonio Baquero, Maria Retter, Timo Schober
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 3:00pm – 3:45pm
- Exhibition Opening
The planet is at its limits, new viruses temporarily paralyse entire countries and the divide between rich and poor is growing. In 2003, Le Monde diplomatique published the first Atlas of Globalisation. It set the bar for journalistic cartography. A comprehensive and vivid collection containing over 200 innovative graphics shows what globalisation stands for in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, for social progress and international communication from San Francisco to Kinshasa.
Eight editions and over 20 years later, this small exhibition is based on the current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) and showcases different types of graphics in their up-to-date version. This exhibition was created for Journalismusfest 2023 and in collaboration with Le Monde diplomatique / Berlin. This year it will open its doors as an extended version.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
As football mania reaches its fever peak in the run up to the European Football Championships and important national and international elections, we put forth the question: Can sports change our society? Learn how athletes can impact the realm of politics and society and join us on our quest to discover positive and negative examples. Are athletes obliged to act like role models and to be politically active or can they simply practice their sport? To what extent can sports act like a game changer?
- With Toni Innauer, Nicole Selmer, Nicola Werdenigg, Philip Bauer, Rainer Schüller
Designing a magazine refers to a highly fascinating field of visual design remaining stunningly vivid even in the digital era. Swiss-based magazine Reportagen does not advocate for quick coverage but for journalistic craft and compelling stories. The magazine spares photos completely. Zurich-based design studio Moiré established a strong brand providing an independent reading experience for this purpose. Illustrations, infographics and a custom-designed font for Reportagen add to and complete the magazine’s texts and underlying concept: Creating tension, diving into detail, maintaining the reader’s attention and shining a light on the sideshow. In 2013, the project was awarded the Design Prize Switzerland. Marc Kappeler from Moiré speaks about the magazine’s development and other projects that his design studio works on.
- With Marc Kappeler, Daniel Puntas Bernat, Nicola Weber
In 2008, Ecuador recognised the rights of Mother Nature “Pachamama” in its constitution. In 2017, New Zealand’s parliament attributed to the Whanganui River the rights of ownership of its fish, plants, water and ground. Nature is no longer just surrounding us, nature is now with us. Ecosystems can become legal entities and they will claim their due: Ecocide as a criminal offence. We can observe the same steps being taken in Columbia, Bolivia, Spain and Ireland. At some point in the future, we will not be able anymore to take advantage of our planet’s buffet of raw materials. At eye level with flora and fauna: What does this mean for biodiversity, for our lifestyle, for our looting growth-driven economy? For our role in this world in the light of a fundamental change of paradigm?
- With Claus Biegert, Christine von Weizsäcker, Tilo Wesche, Biancka Arruda Miranda
SLAPPs – strategic and abusive lawsuits aiming at intimidating and halting critical coverage or activities by environmental or human rights NGOs. SLAPP stands for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation. Sometimes, their aim is not even to succeed in court. Rather, their purpose is to prohibit critical public participation, one of the building blocks of democracy. Behind the suing parties, we often see financially powerful companies, lobby groups or political parties and organisations who have more money on their side than the defendants—so much more that they can put up with losing the case. The lawsuit, or just threatening to file one, aims at intimidating the other party. After abundant political efforts at European level, in spring 2024, the EU adopted a directive to protect people affected. Its implementation requires action by the individual member states.
- With Caterina D’Osualdo, Walter Strobl, Philipp Wissing, Maria Windhager, Daniela Kraus
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 4:30pm – 6:00pm
- Talk
Time and again, headlines bring attention to violence committed by police officers. In 2022, only in Austria, over 300 suspected cases of excessive police violence were registered. They report of racist attacks, radical right-wing chat groups and violent actions against climate protesters. An esprit of corps within those groups often hinders mutual control. On the one hand, people affected therefore have hardly any chance to have their cases independently resolved; and on the other hand, colleagues slowly undermine the reputation of good police officers. What change do we need to see?
- With Hannah Espín Grau, Colette Schmidt, Christina Zühlke
- Friday, 3rd March 2024
- 5:30pm – 6:30pm
- Guided tour
Karl Kraus (1874-1936), the great Austrian writer, satirist, language and media critic, published The Last Days of Mankind (1918), which is now considered world literature, and had a substantial influence on the public realm working as an editor of the newspaper Die Fackel (The Torch) (1898-1936) for decades: On the occasion of his 150th birthday, this guided tour pays tribute to him.
- With Ulrike Tanzer, Markus Ender
- Please register at sekretariat-brenner-archiv@uibk.ac.at
Climate change and globalisation are driving the spread of new and known pathogens on a global scale. Diseases like malaria, dengue fever, leishmaniosis have become prevalent in Europe too. This keeps producing new challenges for infectiologists. From a healthcare policy perspective, there is an international question regarding the global distribution justice of vaccines and medications. Whether it is the plague, flu pandemics, or Covid-19, pandemics all share one common denominator: they change societies.
- With Marcus Bachmann, Alexander Herbig, Günter Weiss, Elke Ziegler
Dealing with the enduring Russian aggression against Ukraine and the subsequent invasion poses a substantial challenge for media and culture professionals. Both document war events, want to incite reflection and inspire to take individual action.
Documentary films represent a potent genre in order to capture the complexity of the war in Ukraine and to convey the humanity of the people affected. It facilitates a record of the cruelty of war, whilst still pointing out the power of resilience and hope of people.
This panel will discuss the challenges of documentary films about Ukraine and the culture of remembrance of the Soviet occupation in the Baltics by referring to occupation museums as cultural institutions. With the visual input of photos and videos, this debate will also shed light on the post-colonial heritage in Eastern Europe and the ongoing ramifications of Russian imperialism and colonialism on politics in this region.
- With Deniss Hanovs, Inga Pylypchuk, Tigran Petrosyan
In Angola, Gabriele Riedle encounters two Queens, meets militia members (former criminals) in a slum that is closed down on a regular basis, and feels a well-known Angolan journalist’s frustration of rooted in the whiteworld’s lack of interest in Africa. Unlike most reporters today, Riedle does not write in the present tense, which conveys a sense of immediacy—but rather in the “literary” past tense. She composes her sentences just like music; because she is convinced that documenting “what is” is impossible, and that each report makes a conscious or unconscious allusion to narrative traditions such as adventure novels. To her current book, a poetic novel about the work of war reporters, she even adds the subtitle “Eine Art Abenteuerroman” (A Type of an Adventure Novel).
- With Gabriele Riedle, Daniel Puntas Bernet
After its premiere at the 2023 edition of Journalismusfest, Germany’s most entertaining stage performance for journalists is back in Austria. The Reporter Slam entails five journalists reporting from their investigations in a varied manner. But there is only one who can become slampion of the night. Who? Our audience will decide. Our guests cover the entire German-speaking area – Germany, Austria, Switzerland, South Tyrol and Luxembourg – ensuring an exhilarating but informative opportunity to round off the night. The winner of the night will be able to participate in the Berlin yearly finale.
- With Dennis Frasch, Hasnain Kazim, Teseo La Marca, Nina Lamparski, Anja Reiter, Jochen Markett, E43
- Friday, 3rd March 2024
- 8:00pm – 9:00pm
- Talk
The fact that he knew the Tyrolean State Anthem off by heart, a song that pays tribute to the heroic death of freedom fighter Andreas Hofer, could have been interpreted as outstanding ambition. And it goes without saying that he mastered the Tyrolean dialect too, he grew up in Tyrol after all. But Emran Feroz, born in Innsbruck, describes that all of this was not enough in order to be perceived as a Tyrolean. In the late 1970s, his father made his way from Kabul to Europe by bus, where he wanted to study. And since his home country was subsequently invaded by the Soviets, he did not want to go back there. Years later, Emran Feroz visited his father’s homeland as a journalist and human rights activist; because he wanted to better understand the situation in Afghanistan. Since the Taliban seized power in 2021, he has been a popular expert on an international level. After his book “Der längste Krieg. 20 Jahre War on Terror” (The Longest War. 20 Years of War on Terror) he has now published his autobiography: “Vom Westen nichts Neues. Ein muslimisches Leben zwischen Alpen und Hindukusch“ (All Quiet in the West. Muslim Lifestyle between Alps and Hindu Kush).
- With Renata Schmidtkunz, Emran Feroz
- Please register via telephone 0512/5343-26220 or at this link.
Jamaram, who have been considered as the unsinkable eight of reggae ever since their foundation at the turn of the millennium, is far from done! The band stands for peace, cosmopolitanism, and respect; but also against war, intolerance, and isolation. Join Jamaram and Jahcoustix in the fight against the decline of clubs and festivals, against courtship through the phone and couch potatoes with junk and schnaps and Netflix. It´s a massive workout for the legs and sweating is guaranteed!
- Admission: 20€ pre-sale until May 5th, 25€ at box office
Have you always wanted to know how the main editorial office of Austrian daily newspaper Standard makes their decisions, what kind of coffee supports this process and why certain topics make it to the cover? The newspaper breakfast is here to give you a sneak peak into the press review conducted by Daniela Kraus and the entire deputy chief editorship. They will also have a look at other newspapers and discuss Rainer Schüller’s favourite type of cake. And you, the audience, will have the opportunity to ask your burning questions.
- With Rainer Schüller, Nana Siebert, Petra Stuiber, Daniela Kraus
Can a constructive and solution-oriented form of journalism be the solution for the increasing media apathy? This approach has big potential, that is for sure: Casting a differentiated view on different solution approaches and successful concepts, constructive journalism can open new perspectives and strengthen the understanding for complexity and ambiguity. But if nobody wants to click on good news, how can constructive and solution-oriented journalism win a majority appeal? Or is there a constructive way of dealing with crises? The panellists report from their practical experience as editor, founder and coach. They address examples of constructive journalism and its advantages.
- With Lucie Černá, Ellen Heinrichs, Nina Schnider, Julia Breitkopf
A Ukrainian journalist team from the Associated Press (AP) documents the atrocities committed by the Russian invasion forces in Mariupol despite the siege. As the only reporters on the ground, they capture crucial images of the war, including the suffering of the civilian population, mass graves and the bombing of a maternity clinic. The documentary film by Pulitzer Prize winner Mstyslav Chernov also shows the effects of the Russia-Ukraine war on the AP press agency. The film is based on Chernov’s daily reports and his own footage from the war zone. This multi-award-winning documentary provides harrowing insights into the suffering of civilians under siege. Despite the gravity of the topic, it takes an invaluable look at the challenges of news journalism in conflict zones and also shows the global impact.
- With Eva Binder
- Admission fee of 7€; free admission for students
A call for more solidarity, unity and activism: Since 2018, visual Artist Katharina Cibulka and her team have been installing hand-embroidered scaffold nets on well-visited, prominent construction sites and inspiring discourse among passers-by with socio-political messages. One sentence starting with “So Long as” and ending in “I Am a Feminist” points at existing inequalities. („Let’s Go Equal. The Solange Project“, published by Hirmer-Verlag, 2024)
During their conversation, Katharina Cibulka and her colleague Tina Themel will illustrate their artistic approach. After that, visitors can visit “arttirol 10”, the presentation of art acquisitions of the Federal State of Tyrol between 2021 and 2023. This also includes a relict (Net no. 5) of the “Wrapping of the Innsbruck Cathedral” by Katharina Cibulka.
- With Katharina Cibulka, Tina Themel, Gerlinde Tamerl
Populist media often provide simplistic solutions for complex problems and issues. For platforms containing such contents it is common to refer to terms like “exchange of populations” and “waves of refugees”. Such vocabulary suggests doomsday images in Europe. What is the purpose of these metaphors and terms like “remigration”? How come that they manage to establish themselves so quickly in our society? We would like to discuss this question in an interactive format, that will also involve the audience’s participation.
- With Daniela Ingruber, Hasnain Kazim, Dajana Mehadžić
Why should I even consider becoming a journalist? Elitist, yet badly paid. Hostilities online and scarce job prospects. Is a journalism career still worthwhile? It is the greatest profession of the world for some after all. How can I get a foothold in the world of media and what are the skills I need to be successful? Students of the German training institution for journalists Deutsche Journalistenschule München present the different training routes to work in an editorial department and give an insight into their own experiences, explaining why it is never too late to start a career in this field.
- With Anna Tratter, Denis Pscheidl
How can you verify whether images show what they claim to be showing? How can an editorial team find out where a video was taken? Whether the footage is recent or years old? There is an increasing need for editorial teams to verify images. Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) is making their lives easier. This term derives from the realm of intelligence services. OSINT journalists use all freely-available online sources: not only photos and videos; but also databases or satellite images. When engaged in open-source investigations, journalists increasingly assume roles similar to those of law enforcement officers. Investigative networks like Bellingcat or Forensic Architecture are specialised in this field. Lea Weinmann, editor of the investigative team of German daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung illustrates this task referring to media coverage from areas torn by war and crises.
- With Lea Weinmann, Birgit Gufler
The 23rd February 2024 was yet another sad low point in Austria’s femicide history: Five women and girls were murdered on a single day due to their gender. A total of 26 femicides were recorded in 2023, making Austria the country with the highest rate of femicides in the EU. For their radio feature, Janina Böck-Koroschitz and Elisabeth Weilenmann met many people who deal with the topic, including the survivor Renate Daurer, the psychiatrist Adelheid Kastner and the doctor Peter Klar, who prevented a femicide. They introduce preventive measures, report about activism and show how moral courage can save lives.
- With Elisabeth Weilenmann, Judith Goetz, Sonja Prieth
In Myanmar, formerly Burma, indications of a positive development have been observed for the first time since the military coup of February 2021. Rebel groups allied with the underground democracy movement engage in nation-wide actions against the military junta. Famous Burmese intellectual, writer, activist and doctor Ma Thida finds the the resistance of the civil society and democratic movement encouraging. The winner of the last elections and Peace Nobel Prize Winner Aun San Suu Kyi was removed by the coup d’état and remains to be incarcerated. A disenchanting situation for media professionals: On the World Press Freedom Index, Myanmar ranks 173th out of 180 states.
Ma Thida too, had been incarcerated for a long time and is now living in exile in Berlin. With journalist and Asia expert Sven Hansen, she discusses the Spring Revolution in Maynmar and how it strives to find a multi-ethnic democratic exit from this labyrinth. International reactions prove to be disappointing.
- With Ma Thida, Sven Hansen
Scientific communication is a broad field, with formats and narrative forms becoming more diverse. Conveying the significance of complex learnings in specialised fields for a broad interested public proves to be an exciting challenge: for journalists as well as for bodies with expertise in imparting information like universities, for influencers on social media and for scientists themselves.
- With Beatrice Lugger, Rudi Nowotny, Amelie Reigl, Uwe Steger, Elke Ziegler, Tanja Traxler
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan of Excel lists,. There is however a second passion, that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibitions for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothespins for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
The Atlas of Globalisation by Le Monde diplomatique has been setting standards in journalistic cartography for 20 years. It represents a comprehensive and clear illustration of what globalisation means in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, and for social progress. The current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) is showcased as part of a collaboration between Journalismusfest with Le Monde Diplomatique / Berlin.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
She was probably the first investigative journalist in the German world. 1923, at the age of 24, Paula Schlier, who had previously published articles against the Nazis as a journalist, sneaked into the party leaflet of the NSDAP, the “Völkischer Beobachter”. Disguised as a secretary she also documented Hitler’s attempted putsch on November 8th/9th 1923. Her diary reports were published in 1926 as a celebrated first work by the Brenner publishing house in Innsbruck: “Petras Aufzeichnungen oder Konzept einer Jugend nach dem Diktat der Zeit” (Petra’s Records or the Concept of Youth under the Dictate of Time) was a statement against a world that was radicalising to the right. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Hitler putsch, Innsbruck-based Germanists Annette Steinsiek and Ursula A. Schneider have published a commentary on Paula Schlier’s report. Based on that, the Bavarian Broadcasting (BR) has produced the documentation “Hitlerputsch 1923. The Diary of Paula Schlier”.
- With Annette Steinsiek, Ursula A. Schneider, Joachim Leitner
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
On October 3rd 2013, a boat sinks off the coast of Lampedusa. More than 300 people die and the then mayor Giusi Nicolini knows: something needs to happen. A few days later, she holds an impressive speech at the EU summit. In 2015, one year after the discontinuation of the Italian state-run rescue operation Mare Nostrum, the organisation for the rescue of life at sea SOS Méditerranée was founded. Since then, it saved 38,500 lives and was awarded the Right Livelihood Award in 2023 for its operation. By now, civil-operated sea rescue has become a difficult undertaking. Europe is closing down its external borders, at times, resorting to violence. Time and time again, we see reports about EU Border Guard Agency Frontex being involved in pushbacks of migrants on the Greek coast.
- With Giorgos Christides, Fyras Mawazini, Giusi Nicolini, Christian Jakob
At a gig in the autumn of 2023, Berlin-based editor for the German weekly newspaper ZEIT Lenz Jacobsen spoke about Austria and Switzerland: “(Sounds like) beautiful countries. If that is the case: Why the hell are we sitting in a grey fairground hall instead of in the Alpine idyll?” This is why the third gig of the three ZEIT editors at Journalismusfest Innsbruck will take place against a unique backdrop for the first time – live at Seegrube cable car station above Innsbruck. Just like every week, the journalists from Innsbruck / Vienna, Zurich, and Berlin will discuss current affairs in their podcast. This time, in the midst of an Alpine idyll.
- With Matthias Daum, Florian Gasser, Lenz Jacobson
- Saturday, 4th May 2024
- 3:00pm – 4:30pm
- Talk
Following the Hamas massacre on October 7th 2023, war in Israel and Palestine has erupted once more and has also been dominating German speaking media. For the Palestinian and Israeli-Jewish diaspora the war is closer than just an image on the news: They are worried about relatives and friends and facing hostilities and a tense discourse themselves. Jewish Israelis and Palestinians sharing a panel has become an exception by now. Alena Jabarine and Tomer Dotan-Dreyfus will do just that. With Bascha Mika they will talk about their view on the conflict, being seen and being ignored, and the debate in the German-speaking world.
- With Alena Jabarine, Tomer Dotan-Dreyfus, Bascha Mika
In November 2022 shocking allegations were made about German oil company Wintershall Dea. German media alleged links between Wintershall and the Russian military, claiming that companies owned jointly by Wintershall and Russian state-owned gas company Gazprom had been drilling for gas in western Siberia and produced fuel used by Russian fighter jets as they attacked Ukrainian civilians.
Wintershall denied these accusations, claiming a lack of evidence. But in April 2023, an investigation led by Global Witness revealed new evidence of the supply chains connecting Wintershall’s Siberian gas fields to Russia’s military supply chains, showing how gas condensate from Wintershall’s fields in Western Siberia feed a refinery which sends diesel to Russian military suppliers.
This short film looks at the human stories behind our investigation. Filmed largely in Ukraine, it includes powerful testimonies from survivors of Russian air attacks. It asks the question: whilst western governments decry the war in Ukraine, how has this been allowed to happen?
- With Pavle Popovic, Emma Strauss, Michael Hornsby
- Free admission.
The Mediterranean region is a hotspot in which crises and challenges overlap. The sea is warming up more than the global average, the ecosystem is being severely affected by oil and gas extraction, climate change is having a socio-economic impact on coastal areas and large-scale fishing is robbing traditional fisheries of their livelihoods. But there are also pioneers of sustainability and there is a great deal of commitment to rescuing refugees.
The journalist Stefano Liberti and the photographer Francesco Bellina are travelling throughout the Mediterranean for a large documentary project: The research trip leads them to Murcia and Favignana off Sicily, to Tanger and the Kerkennah Islands off Tunisia, to the Nile Delta and the Suez Canal, to Cyprus, to the islands of Antikythera and Jabuka, all the way to Venice.
- With Francesco Bellina, Stefano Liberti, Benedikt Sauer
- Saturday, 4th May 2024
- 5:00pm – 6:30pm
- Talk
Ever since Victor Orbán has been in power in Hungary, the media has gradually been taken under the control of the government. In Reporters Without Borders’ ranking of press freedom, Hungary comes last in the EU. The weekly newspaper HVG remains one of the last independent newspapers and its editor-in-chief is a guest at the Journalismusfest.
Large foundations have recently become involved in Eastern European countries in order to preserve the remaining media diversity and thus strengthen democracies. In 2021, the Dutch Plūrālis Foundation was founded with the aim of investing specifically in Eastern European media. The Austrian ERSTE Foundation is also invested in Plūrālis.
- With Márton Gergely, Maribel Königer, Nina Horaczek
Documentary filmmaker Gianfranco Rosi spent over a year on the Italian island of Lampedusa, observing how refugees arrive here every day in the hope of a better life and how the people react towards them. Twelve-year-old Samuele, who witnesses a great human tragedy with his family, is at the centre of the film, which also deals with media coverage. Through his everyday observations, Gianfranco Rosi approaches a place that is as real as it is symbolic as well as the emotional world of some of its inhabitants, who are exposed to a permanent state of emergency. And at the same time, the film, which does not need a narration, describes how even in the smallest of spaces, two worlds barely touch.
- With Giusi Nicolini
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
In light of the massive environmental destruction that is now affecting the entire planet and challenging human existence, a question urgently arises: Is the human being a Homo destructor who destroys its environment always and everywhere? Or do we have a destructive side that only becomes visible under certain circumstances? Do humans only turn into Homo destructor at a certain point in time?
The well-known geographer and doyen of Alpine research Werner Bätzing gets to the bottom of these questions in a comprehensive history of man and the environment. Cultural self-limitation in earlier times is called into question by the industrial revolution, modern science, enlightenment and the market economy. This is the beginning of a way of thinking and acting that exploits nature and the environment on a short-term basis and destroys the limited earth. Bätzing pleads in his Opus magnum “Homo destructor” (Beck, 2023) for a new cultural self-limitation.
- With Werner Bätzing, Wolfger Mayrhofer
- Please register at: daniela.greimel@tyrolia.at.
Armin Thurnher, who turned 75 in February, is one of the most sharp-witted analysts in Austria and an excellent essayist. He shaped the public discourse with his analyses of the political situation and the Media landscapes in Austria and Europe. Thurnher is from Bregenz and co-founded the weekly newspaper Falter in 1977. He is its publisher and still one of the two editors-in-chief. In addition, he is the author of 13 books. His most recent publications are the novel “Fähre nach Manhatten”, the political essay “Anstandslos” and “Preis und Klage. Reden und Nachreden in Versen”. Armin Thurnher received numerous prizes and awards. In March 2024 he received the Austrian State Prize for Cultural Journalism.
- With Armin Thurnher, Ivona Jelčić
- Please register at literatur@wagnersche.at.
Eric Frey, editor of Standard, explains in the podcast “Topic of the Day” how explosive the current world situation is. How the war in Ukraine rewrites the world order. What this means for China/Taiwan and North Korea. And how the USA and Europe fall under pressure. He also analyses how the multiple conflicts are connected to each other and if and how a third world war could come about, that has been taking place virtually for a long time already.
- With Eric Frey, Zsolt Wilhelm
“Your arrival in the kitchens of the world was your death sentence”, is how Rocío Puntas Bernet’s report begins, which can be experienced as a staged reading at the Journalismusfest Innsbruck: a report about the coveted bluefin tuna. Within 30 years the former large stocks collapsed. The global boom in sushi has led to massive fishing pressure, particularly in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. In the Turkish part of these seas it is considered extinct. In order to satisfy the global hunger for sushi, the huge animals are fattened in large numbers in the Mediterranean.
A story about the legal grey areas in the food industry and an ode to tuna. The Bühnen Bern and the journal Reportagen present their original stage format for the first time in Austria.
- With Linus Schütz, Daniel Puntas Bernet, Axel Hein
- Admission: 10€, tickets: www.treibhaus.at
In times of heated information dissemination and opinion-forming, the question arises as to whether other methods of “news” formats are needed to keep attention on topics of long-term explosiveness. Public debates about flight and migration in particular show that these topics are both highly polarizing and important “focal points” of remembrance culture and contemporary history. They also often provide an anchor for long-term civic commitment. How can (auto)biographical narratives help to bear witness to reality and reach a broad public? How can we prevent tragedies from becoming the object of sensationalism? Can we do justice to individuals and are biographical approaches a legitimate means of providing information?
- With Yirgalem Fisseha Mebrahtu, Dr. Grażyna Jurewicz, Magdalena Modler-El Abdaoui
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Thursday, 2nd May at 8:00pm at Waltherpark.
- Admission 7€; free admission for students
The Ensemble Yagódy is one of the most charismatic Ukrainian folk ensembles from Lviv. Founded in the year 2016 at the Theater-Faculty, Yagódy launched their debut album in 2020. The four founding women travelled through several Ukrainian oblasts to track down the musical traditions of the people there. From this inexhaustible number of songs about life, Yagódy create their own exciting and unmistakable sound. The musicians feel at home in the theatre and realize their musical ideas for the stage according to dramaturgical principles. Their songs are love letters from the past, which have not arrived yet.
- Admission: 20€ pre-sale until May 5th, 25€ at box office
Matthias Krapf, one of the two editors-in-chief of the daily newspaper Tiroler Tageszeitung, discusses the current Saturday and Sunday editions of Tiroler Tageszeitung with the audience over a cup of coffee at the pastry shop Munding.
- With Matthias Krapf
- Sunday, 5th May 2024
- 10:00am – 11:30am
- Reading and conversation
A photo album with 378 passport photos is found at the flea market: Jacob B’chiri photographed himself every day for a year in a photo booth in various disguises and poses. The first-person narrator now follows his tracks, from Paris to Rome and Marseille, to the cemeteries of Djerba and to the edges of the Israeli desert. In doing so, he explores The Lives of Jacob (Hanser 2023) – “the lives” because this word only exists in plural in Hebrew: a clever novel between literature and journalistic research, about the relationship between photography and identity, about the experience of war and exile, Jewish history, faith and the great tragedies of the 20th century.
- With Christophe Boltanski, Maria Piok
The full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 sparked a major reevaluation of Europe’s business, energy and political ties to Russia, vindicating those investigative journalists who had been raising the alarm about Russia’s corrupting influence in Europe for years. More than two years into the war, which topics are still under-reported, how can journalists approach them, and has the media caught up with the new reality?
Ukrainian and German journalists and civil society experts will share findings from their research and reporting, and discuss what’s next when covering the Kremlin’s influence in Europe.
- With Olesia Horiainova, Tanya Kozyreva, Sebastian Rötters, Mattia Nelles
The Claus Gatterer award for Socially Committed Quality Journalism is named after an excellent journalist, historian, writer and documentary filmmaker. Gatterer, who was born in 1924 in Sexten/South Tyrol, has left many traces: with ground breaking contemporary historical and literary works on Austria, Italy and South Tyrol as well as a journalist in Austria’s media landscape, especially with his socially critical ORF television magazine teleobjektiv. Gatterer’s focus on social and ethnic minorities has shaped a generation of journalists.
What can socially committed journalism mean today?
- With Günther Pallaver, Christoph Franceschini, Edith Meinhart, Ed Moschitz, Rebecca Sandbichler, Daniela Kraus
The streets and roads of Innsbruck belong to all who live here. And yet cars enjoy priority in the public space. The Radlobby Tirol has analysed critical points in the city centre and will explain on the city walk how much space is available for which form of mobility. And we will question if this is really fair. The route is around 1.6 km long and leads to the freight terminal, where the discussion will continue.
- With Josef Scheiring
Bicycles have a hard time not only in public spaces, but also in media coverage. Instead of being seen as part of the solution – for example for traffic, environmental and health problems – it is often presented as a problem. Instead of being recognized as a serious form of mobility, it is dismissed as a toy. How do journalists and experts who have dedicated themselves to the topic deal with this?
- With Josef Scheiring, Stefanie Ruep, Christoph Berger-Schauer, Thomas Pupp, Simon Welebil
In Mexico, thousands of people disappear on their way to the USA, and relatives never stop looking for them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus
In recent years, people like former CIA employee Edward Snowden or Australian investigative journalist Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks, have put their own safety and freedom at risk to enlighten the public by disclosing secret information about state crimes. For this courage, the whistleblower pay a huge price. In exile in Moscow, Snowden is dependent on the benevolence of autocrat Vladimir Putin, while Assange has been imprisoned in the UK for five years and faces life imprisonment if extradited to the USA. Human rights lawyer Robert Tibbo, who arranged Snowden’s escape, and British whistleblower and former ambassador Craig Murray discuss with Ilja Braun from Reporters Without Borders/Germany how to better protect those who bring the truth to light.
- With Ilja Braun, Craig Murray, Robert Tibbo, Emily Busvine
For the second time, the podcast “Inside Austria” by Der Standard and Der Spiegel will be performed live at the Journalismusfest Innsbruck.
- With Robert Treichler, Lucia Heisterkamp, Margit Ehrenhöfer, Katharina Mittelstaedt
Since the attack by Hamas terrorists on October 7, in which around 1,200 mostly Jewish-Israelis were brutally murdered and 253 people were taken hostage, and according to UN figures, more than 30,000 people have died as a result of the ongoing attacks by the Israeli military on the Gaza Strip (March 2024) and many are threatened with starvation, the region has become the focus of global media coverage. However, journalistic work in the war zone in Gaza remains extremely risky: According to the Committee to Protect Journalists at least 95 journalists, mostly Palestinians, have been killed in Gaza since the war started.
How do two journalists from Israel-Palestine, a Jewish-Israeli editor and a Palestinian journalist from Gaza, see the challenges for reporting now in a new time of war? How do they rate the media landscape(s) in the region? What perspectives do they see for the region?
Hanno Loewy, director of the Jewish Museum Hohenems, will lead the dialogue.
- With Tamar Tsvaigrach, Ahmed Alnaouq, Hanno Loewy
Treibhaus and Gemeindemuseum Absam commemorate the sceptical physician and publicist Werner Vogt from Zams in Tyrol, a pioneer of civil society.
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival, we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Saturday, 4th May at 8:15pm in Cinematograph.
A Ukrainian journalist team from the Associated Press (AP) documents the atrocities committed by the Russian invasion forces in Mariupol despite the siege. As the only reporters on the ground, they capture crucial images of the war, including the suffering of the civilian population, mass graves and the bombing of a maternity clinic. The documentary film by Pulitzer Prize winner Mstyslav Chernov also shows the effects of the Russia-Ukraine war on the AP press agency. The film is based on Chernov’s daily reports and his own footage from the war zone. This multi-award-winning documentary provides harrowing insights into the suffering of civilians under siege. Despite the gravity of the topic, it takes an invaluable look at the challenges of news journalism in conflict zones and also shows the global impact.
- With Eva Binder
- Admission fee of 7€; free admission for students
She was probably the first investigative journalist in the German world. 1923, at the age of 24, Paula Schlier, who had previously published articles against the Nazis as a journalist, sneaked into the party leaflet of the NSDAP, the “Völkischer Beobachter”. Disguised as a secretary she also documented Hitler’s attempted putsch on November 8th/9th 1923. Her diary reports were published in 1926 as a celebrated first work by the Brenner publishing house in Innsbruck: “Petras Aufzeichnungen oder Konzept einer Jugend nach dem Diktat der Zeit” (Petra’s Records or the Concept of Youth under the Dictate of Time) was a statement against a world that was radicalising to the right. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Hitler putsch, Innsbruck-based Germanists Annette Steinsiek and Ursula A. Schneider have published a commentary on Paula Schlier’s report. Based on that, the Bavarian Broadcasting (BR) has produced the documentation “Hitlerputsch 1923. The Diary of Paula Schlier”.
- With Annette Steinsiek, Ursula A. Schneider, Joachim Leitner
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
In November 2022 shocking allegations were made about German oil company Wintershall Dea. German media alleged links between Wintershall and the Russian military, claiming that companies owned jointly by Wintershall and Russian state-owned gas company Gazprom had been drilling for gas in western Siberia and produced fuel used by Russian fighter jets as they attacked Ukrainian civilians.
Wintershall denied these accusations, claiming a lack of evidence. But in April 2023, an investigation led by Global Witness revealed new evidence of the supply chains connecting Wintershall’s Siberian gas fields to Russia’s military supply chains, showing how gas condensate from Wintershall’s fields in Western Siberia feed a refinery which sends diesel to Russian military suppliers.
This short film looks at the human stories behind our investigation. Filmed largely in Ukraine, it includes powerful testimonies from survivors of Russian air attacks. It asks the question: whilst western governments decry the war in Ukraine, how has this been allowed to happen?
- With Pavle Popovic, Emma Strauss, Michael Hornsby
- Free admission.
Documentary filmmaker Gianfranco Rosi spent over a year on the Italian island of Lampedusa, observing how refugees arrive here every day in the hope of a better life and how the people react towards them. Twelve-year-old Samuele, who witnesses a great human tragedy with his family, is at the centre of the film, which also deals with media coverage. Through his everyday observations, Gianfranco Rosi approaches a place that is as real as it is symbolic as well as the emotional world of some of its inhabitants, who are exposed to a permanent state of emergency. And at the same time, the film, which does not need a narration, describes how even in the smallest of spaces, two worlds barely touch.
- With Giusi Nicolini
- Admission 7€; free admission for students.
In collaboration with the International Film Festival Innsbruck IFFI, we are screening a surprise film before the official opening of Journalismusfest 2024 in Waltherpark. A few days before the festival we are going to announce the film here. Another screening of the same film will take place on Thursday, 2nd May at 8:00pm at Waltherpark.
- Admission 7€; free admission for students
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan and creator of Excel lists. There is however a second passion that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he has created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibition for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothes pegs for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 2:00pm – 3:30pm
- Exhibition opening with guided tour in the inner courtyard of the Faculty of Catholic Theology, afterwards in the Cultural Bakehouse Bäckerei. Conversation as part of the opening.
In Mexico, thousands of people are disappearing on their way to the US. Their relatives embark on a relentless search to find them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus, Barbara Bachmann
- Friday, 3rd May 2024
- 3:00pm – 3:45pm
- Exhibition Opening
The planet is at its limits, new viruses temporarily paralyse entire countries and the divide between rich and poor is growing. In 2003, Le Monde diplomatique published the first Atlas of Globalisation. It set the bar for journalistic cartography. A comprehensive and vivid collection containing over 200 innovative graphics shows what globalisation stands for in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, for social progress and international communication from San Francisco to Kinshasa.
Eight editions and over 20 years later, this small exhibition is based on the current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) and showcases different types of graphics in their up-to-date version. This exhibition was created for Journalismusfest 2023 and in collaboration with Le Monde diplomatique / Berlin. This year it will open its doors as an extended version.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
Martin Thür is anchorman of the Austrian news programme ZIB 2 and a zealous fan of Excel lists,. There is however a second passion, that he is less well-known for: collecting whimsical campaign gifts. On the occasion of the super election year 2024, he created an Excel list with his funniest and strangest campaign gifts. At this year’s Journalismusfest, he is going to open the doors to this selection in an exclusive exhibitions for the first time. Stop by to see highlights like an Erwin Pröll action figure, an ice scraper “against the social cold” and clothespins for solar-powered drying.
- With Martin Thür
The Atlas of Globalisation by Le Monde diplomatique has been setting standards in journalistic cartography for 20 years. It represents a comprehensive and clear illustration of what globalisation means in the 21st century: for the freedom of movement of people and goods, for political participation, and for social progress. The current Atlas of Globalisation labelled “Ungleiche Welt” (Unequal World) is showcased as part of a collaboration between Journalismusfest with Le Monde Diplomatique / Berlin.
- With Adolf Buitenhuis
In Mexico, thousands of people disappear on their way to the USA, and relatives never stop looking for them. On the Italian island of Lampedusa, tourists encounter hundreds of migrants. In Ukraine, people keep fighting for sovereignty; a fight that extends to borders that traverse the middle of society.
Innsbruck-based photographer Helena Lea Manhartsberger addresses global inequalities in three completely different regions. Her work sheds light on the brutality of existing structures of power and institutionalised racism; but also solidarity, hope and resistance of civil players. Manhartsberger tells the stories of individuals, without losing sight of the big picture.
- With Helena Lea Manhartsberger, Nora Belghaus
The 23rd February 2024 was yet another sad low point in Austria’s femicide history: Five women and girls were murdered on a single day due to their gender. A total of 26 femicides were recorded in 2023, making Austria the country with the highest rate of femicides in the EU. For their radio feature, Janina Böck-Koroschitz and Elisabeth Weilenmann met many people who deal with the topic, including the survivor Renate Daurer, the psychiatrist Adelheid Kastner and the doctor Peter Klar, who prevented a femicide. They introduce preventive measures, report about activism and show how moral courage can save lives.
- With Elisabeth Weilenmann, Judith Goetz, Sonja Prieth
The locations
The festival venues are in the center of Innsbruck. They can be easily reached on foot.
The participants
We look forward to journalists, scientists and NGOs from different regions of the world.
Information
Information on tickets, arrival, hotels, public transport and news about the city and the region.
