Gabriele Zuna-Kratky

Gabriele Zuna-Kratky has been the Director of Technisches Museum Wien since 1st January 2000. In addition to managing and organising the museum, her tasks include fundraising and cooperation.

Ms Zuna-Kratky was born on 8th September 1957 in Vienna and worked as a teacher for pre-vocational schools between 1981 and 1988.

In June 1988, she received her doctorate in Philosophy and started her career in the Austrian Ministry for Education and Culture. There she worked for the school broadcasts and media education department as well as for the media service department; Ms Zuna-Kratky became head of the media service department on 1st February 1993.

In October 1997, Gabriele Zuna-Kratky was made Director of Österreichische Phonothek, and three years later, on 1st January 2000, she became the first female director of a technological museum. In this position, it was her first big challenge to transfer Technisches Museum Wien into an 'Anstalt öffentlichen Rechts' or 'institution under public law'. In times where the culture and leisure market is hard-fought, there is an increasing economic pressure on museums to think and act in a profit-oriented way. Therefore, success is, to a great deal, based on long-term cooperation with the economy.

Of course, Technisches Museum Wien also strengthens its efforts for national and international cooperation with cultural and educational institutions. Cooperation with educational organisations – schools of all levels and adult education institutions - is as important a task as increased publication activities and public relations.