You can still see them on a zebra crossing at Praterstern, dark streaks on the white markings: handprints on the asphalt. Bianca Müller’s right hand must also be immortalized somewhere here. In November 2023, the last generation paralyzed traffic at one of Vienna‘s most important junctions.
Now the 30-year-old is sitting on a lawn in the Volksgarten on a Thursday in September. Brown hair in a loose bun, long bangs in front of her forehead. Here in the garden she often met with other members to plan protests. Her eyes light up as she pulls out two small copper pipes from her bag. Your fingertips fit right in. “I used it to stick myself under a car,” she says, sounding proud. It was one of the last generation’s techniques to bring traffic to a standstill for as long as possible: They stuck their fingers in copper pipes – and the pipes in turn stuck to the linkages of cars. In 2023, Müller and others blocked the A 2 roadway in the cold autumn until the police Müller had to cut himself away from the dark blue Opel Zafira. She says today that nothing in her life has ever felt more right than lying there under the car. “Activism was my home.” Then she cries.
