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Internationally famous for housing the world's largest collection of works (twenty-four in total), by Gustav Klimt, including The Kiss, the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere is also home to masterworks by Oskar Kokoschka and Egon Schiele.
Klimt's later pieces incorporate the influences of the younger Schiele and the Fauvist movement. Other Klimts belonging to the Gallery include portraits of Sonja Knips and Fritza Riedler, his famous Judith, and a series of magnificent landscape paintings, such as Mohnwiese and Sonnenblume. The Gallery is located in the Belvedere complex of royal buildings in Vienna, originally built for Prince Eugene of Savoy, one of the most successful European military commanders in history. The Habsburgs left him some of their art collection.
The Austrian government cared for the lavish and expensive buildings for centuries, finally electing to open them to the public in the service of art education and cultural revitalization. The 1920s were a time of intense vitality and creativity in Vienna, as thematized in the masterful book Wittgenstein's Poker, even as the great menace of tyranny was growing in its midst. In many ways the Weimar government was innovative and open by today's standards, pursuing great projects of public art and civic engagement. In 1921 it retained Hans Tietze, an art historian who later found refuge in the U.S., to initiate the creation of the Gallery within the Belvedere, adding a Baroque museum in 1923 in the Lower Belvedere, a 19th century gallery in the Upper Belvedere in 1924, and a modern gallery in the Orangerie in 1929.
When Tietze directed the opening of the gallery, it featured many turn-of-the-century works which the gallery now displays together, including Van Gogh's Plain Near Auvers and Rodin's bust of Henri de Rochefort-Luçay. After World War I, the gallery drew more works from artists of the areas near the Alps, traditionally less represented among major artists. The Belvedere's collection from the interwar period is significant, with a thorough avant-garde presence.
Sources
Sources
- Edmonds, David, and John Eidinow. Wittgenstein's Poker: The Story of a Ten-Minute Argument Between Two Great Philosophers. New York: Harper Collins, 2002.
- Krapf, Michael. Das Museum. Spiegel und Motor kulturpolitischer Visionen. Vienna: Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, 2004.
- Lechner, Georg and Stephanie Neudorfer. Meisterwerke des Belvedere. Vienna: Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, 2012.
- Mlnarik, Heinz. Von der Gründung der Modernen Galerie zur Österreichischen Galerie. Vienna: Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, 1996.
- "Schwimmendes Mahnmal vor dem Belvedere." Wien.orf.at. Sep. 7, 2016, https://wien.orf.at/v2/news/stories/2784594/.
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Here is what Wikipedia says about Österreichische Galerie Belvedere
The Österreichische Galerie Belvedere is a museum housed in the Belvedere palace, in Vienna, Austria.
The Belvedere palaces were the summer residence of Prince Eugene of Savoy (1663–1736). The ensemble was built in the early eighteenth century by the famous Baroque architect, Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt, and comprises the Upper and Lower Belvedere, with the Orangery and Palace Stables, as well as extensive gardens.
Today, the Belvedere houses the greatest collection of Austrian art dating from the Middle Ages to the present day, complemented by the works of international artists. At the Upper Belvedere, visitors not only encounter artworks drawn from over five hundred years of art history but can also experience the magnificent staterooms. In addition to the Lower and Upper Belvedere, the museum has further sites at Prince Eugene's town palace and the 21er Haus as well as the Gustinus Ambrosi Museum.
The Belvedere's art collection presents an almost complete overview of the development of art in Austria and, thus, an insight into the country's history. The world's largest collection of Gustav Klimt's paintings lies at the heart of the presentation of Art around 1900, on show at the Upper Belvedere. Its highlights are Klimt's paintings, The Kiss (1908) and Judith and the Head of Holofernes (1901), and masterpieces by Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka. Key works of French Impressionism and the greatest collection of Viennese Biedermeier art are further attractions at the museum.
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