Austria Festival Director Resigns

In response to the new Austrian government coalition between the conservative People’s Party and the far-right Freedom Party, Gerard Mortier, general manager and artistic director of the famed annual Salzburg Festival, said he has asked to be released from his contract after the conclusion of this summer’s festival.

Mortier, a Belgian, has headed the festival since 1992. He originally planned to spend 10 years in Salzburg, leaving when his contract expired after the 2001 festival. In December, German composer Peter Ruzicka was named to replace him.

Mortier’s resignation, announced Monday, comes in the wake of the swearing-in Friday of the new coalition government that includes members of the controversial Freedom Party. Headed by Joerg Haider, the party has been denounced inside and outside Austria for its far-right positions. U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has said the party “doesn’t distance itself clearly from the atrocities of the Nazi era and the politics of hate.”

Since Friday, the European Union has moved to limit political contacts with Austria, tourism boycotts have been threatened, the U.S. has temporarily recalled its ambassador, and anti-rightist protesters have clashed with police in Vienna.

The Salzburg Festival, which was founded in 1917 and is supported in part by the Austrian government, is considered by many to be the world’s most prestigious and glamorous music festival. Under Mortier’s leadership, it has changed its image as a bastion of musty conservatism and musical big business to become a venue for innovative opera productions and new works.

Though controversial with traditionalists, Mortier has demonstrated an ability to attract new international audiences and foreign donors to the event--among them Los Angeles patron Betty Freeman, who has sponsored annual new music concerts in Salzburg and commissioned an opera for this summer, Kaija Saariaho’s “L’Amour de Loin,” which will be directed by Peter Sellars of Los Angeles.

Freeman said she supports Mortier’s resignation and has no plans to continue financing the festival.

Mortier, who is vacationing in Southern California, has not been available for comment since his resignation was made public.

In an informal meeting with The Times over the weekend, he expressed his distaste for the Freedom Party in general and its reactionary arts agenda in particular. Two of the five voting members of the festival’s Supervisory Board will be appointed by the new coalition government, he said, and he now expects to have only a single ally on the board, Salzburg’s Social Democrat mayor, Heinz Schaden.

In the news release announcing his intentions, Mortier said he will continue his cultural activities in Austria “in collaboration with democratic forces.”

The festival Supervisory Board, which is not scheduled to meet until May, has had no comment on Mortier’s resignation.