Join us for a visit to one of the scariest museums in Vienna, the Torture Museum and be surprised by how many countries still practice inhuman torture despite a myriad of national and international laws and conventions.
The Viennese Torture Museum, Foltermuseum exhibits disturbing evidence of our dark side throughout the history from ancient times up to the present day.
The development of the law is well presented with the 100 exhibits and analytical texts and illustrious wall paintings depicting torture and cruelty spread over the 800 square meter exhibition. When you go through the gruesome torture methods, you will agree that some will be truly difficult for us to understand and even appear unreal.
One of these facts is the frightening truth that torture is still practised. It is practised in many countries all over the world. Hence, the purpose of the museum not only to entertain the odd visitor but to act as a warning. To this end, there is a clear educational angle in the exhibition. Towards the end, the info tables about the current countries exercising torture and their methods in use are perhaps the most disturbing part. There are shocking lists of current practices in Algeria, Brazil, China, Iran, Nigeria, North Korea Russia, Syria and the United States on the walls. The boundary between justice and injustice is by far not clear.
The special exhibition about Guantanamo Bay gives a gloomy picture of the times where we live in. The “Torture Today” by Amnesty International is not something one would expect to see in the third millennium any more.
The museum is located in a historical WW2 bunker with stairs down from the street with no lift, so unfortunately, it is not good for visitors in a wheelchair or with a pram. The loos in the museum are a few steps up from the floor, so they are not good for the disabled either.
There is a small museum shop at the ticket counter.
You need to sooth your nerves after the museum somewhere else as there is no café. A return to the normal world is very close, e.g. in the Mariahilferstraße nearby.
Foltermuseum
Fritz-Grünbaum-Platz 1 1060 Vienna
www.foltermuseum.at