Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Vienna, Austria, 4 Sep 2007: Kunsthistorisches Museum
Gemaldegalerie, Egyptian, Greek & Roman Collections
Vienna's Kunsthistorisches Museum boasts continental Europe's largest collection of art and antiquity, the fruit of the Habsburg rulers' predilection for amassing choice pieces throughout the expansive Austrian-Hungarian empire during their long 800-year domination.  Antiquity from ancient Egyptian, Greek, Hellenistic and Roman civilizations are exhibited on the ground floor of the heavy neoclassical museum building. The painting collection, Gemäldegalerie, is on the first floor.Canova's oeuvre Theseus Battling the Minotaur, marble made flesh, sits on a landing midway up the central staircase to the art gallery. Stand in awe of the life-like muscular tension between the hero and the struggling Minotaur. Flinch at the monster's agonized grimace moments before the fatal blow. The Gemäldegalerie comprises paintings by Northern (Nederlandisch, Flanders) and Southern (Italian, Spanish) European artists displayed in the north and south wings, respectively. The collection features the world's biggest cache of works by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (including the fascinating Hunters in the Snow), rooms full of Rubens, Rembrandt, Titian, as well as rare Giorgione (filled with poetry and mystery), Velázquez (well traveled  court painter-cum-art procurer to the Spanish Habsburg King Philip IV) and one sublime Vermeer.The antiquities collection of Egyptian, Near East, Greek and Roman ancient artefacts resides in the south wing on the ground floor. Highlights include the largest assembly of papyri in the world, several noteworthy statues and carvings - e.g., fragments from the famous Parthenon Frieze, the Amazonian Sacrophagus with its dramatic battle scene relief - and an unmatched prized treasure trove of Roman cameos and jewellery. The museum's remaining section, the Kunstkammer, features sculpture and the decorative arts. An unbridled orgy of rococo excess, the collection acquired some notoriety from the bizarre circumstances surrounding the theft and subsequent recovery of its celebrated centrepiece, Cellini's Saliera. |
Labels: antiquity, art, Austria, history, museum, sculpture, Vienna
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very interesting post, and also complete and cultural too. I love this kind of blog and always come across to yours.
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