I am writing the catalogue for Lace, not Lace. I have four artists who hail from the Czech Republic, one from Slovenia, and one from Hungary. I feel like there is an influence of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that I should acknowledge in the curatorial essay. I believe I have read about an effort to promote lacemaking for all the usual late 19th century reasons, for instance, women's employment and alleviation of economic distress, made by this Empire, and that I have read that the Empress (Elizabeth?) was a patroness. I cannot find whatever it is that I read that gave me that impression. Does anyone have a source, possibly the source, in English that explains this effort? Also, what do we think about this? My artists speak about the lace heritage of their countries. They tend not to mention the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and I think that there are reasons for this, in that their countries were not necessarily willing participants in the Empire. However, even in the case of a pre-existing lace tradition, did the stimulation of Imperial patronage give an extra shot in the arm to late 19th and early 20th century lace production? There are no Austrian artists that are part of the show, although extremely innovative lace was made in the Vienna Spitzenkurs and the Wiener Werkstatte. I realize that in this day and age, it is customary to bad mouth the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but did they play a positive role in lace history? Devon
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