Abstract

All three elements of Neurath's work—the philosophical, the theoretical, and the applied social scientific ones—are united by his Enlightenment ambition to put scientific and philosophical knowledge at the service of the betterment of the life conditions of the general population and the democratization of society. Therefore no one of the three fields of Neurath's activity should be considered in isolation from the others. It is one of the merits of Otto Neurath: Museum and Exhibition Work: Spaces (Designed) for Communication that Hadwig Kraeutler—herself a practicising museologist—portrays Neurath's museum and exhibition work as an attempt at the practical realization of the theoretical insights and principles arrived at in his social scientific and philosophical work. Kraeutler's book is illustrated to provide visual evidence of uses of Neurath's picture language and exhibition technique. The author's argumentation could be tighter, and some nonidiomatic usage requires sympathetic interpretation, but overall a good case is made for the importance of Neurath's work in this field. Whether it is entirely felicitous to place Neurath's enlightenment efforts into the postmodern company of Eilean Hooper‐Greenhill's “post‐museum” and George Hein's “constructivist museum” without also discussing their differences may appear debatable, of course. But Kraeutler has established beyond doubt that in his museum and exhibition work, as in his other enterprises, Neurath challenged traditional assumptions and remains surprisingly relevant.