Vienna...7th July.

Today, dressed in an ironed white shirt and very dark blue trousers (to end up visiting the Loos American Bar), I ventured out to walk towards the Schloss Belvedere where Austrian Art, from baroque to contemporary art is housed (as well as other European painters). 

Many visitors come to see paintings of just one painter, Gustav Klimt.

I cut through Sunnhof, a pedestrian thoroughfare created by the family 'Sunn' in the 1830's, revitalised in the 1980's but without the planned glazed roof, someone has created a much more charming alternative....

For the first time in a long time, the sky was overcast, rain was forecast later.. so started to have umbrellas on my mind... 

Further on I glimpsed a golden domed church and decided to take a detour and investigate. It is the Russian Orthodox Cathedral of St Nicholas, seemingly the largest Russian Orthodox cathedral outside Russia and was restored from 2003 to 2009..

  

(.. picture from a website... no blue sky today...)

Either a service had recently finished or there was a family event happening as people were congregated in the small garden that surrounds it, so I felt disinclined to try to enter..... the armed police on the road in front firmed up my decision... the Russian Embassy is close by..

Moving on, and trying not to walk on the main avenues, I cut through the Botanical garden which was beautiful, not just for all the different plants, but because of the shade. My white shirt is not the best for keeping cool...

A 'secret' walled garden, a few tourists like me..but on every map of Vienna...

I ended up walking all the way though the garden, missing the exit to the Belvedere itself but no matter, I entered from the top to view the Upper Belvedere.. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belvedere,_Vienna

Lining up for tickets, there were ticket options either just to see the Klimt in the upper Belvedere or a combined ticket for the upper and lower Belvederes and Building 21 that shows the current contemporary art exhibitions. 

Access to the upper Belvedere is time managed; your access time is on your ticket. This helps spread the visitors through the building with a further managed small queue to see the 19C art, where the Klimt painting is.. I only had 20 minutes to wait so sat on a bench to until my time..

A sudden gust of wind threatened to take my hat.. instinctively I reached out to grab it and forgot that I was holding a 'cap-less'  bottle of water, pouring water all across my trousers.. I had 5 minutes before my time.. blessed are those who wear really dark trousers when deciding to pour water over them.. .. There can't be many people who enter the Belvedere with sodden trousers.. Now my hat became really useful.. to hide the embarrassing wet patches while I dripped dried...

Anyway.... here it is....

Other Klimt paintings.......

Each gallery sought to explain the rapid changes that occurred during the early 20C; from Secessionist's search for beauty being replaced by Expressionism, a 'harsh quest for truth, inspired by psychoanalysis and 'life reform' movements' as mentioned in the gallery boards Egon Schiele being the best known proponent of Austrian Expressionism. 

The galleries are laid out to show how art reflected the social changes from the early 19C to the 1950's...

Jacque Louis David.. This famous painting of Napoleon... invading Austria....

The picture below could be one of the first deliberate PR exercises.. painted after 1800, this image of the Emperor working in a plain and functional room was reproduced many times to show the him concerned and working on state matters....

This portrait below was painted by Barbara Krafft, at 22, one of the few women accepted into the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts.. beautifully observed.  

After the Congress of Vienna, the emergence of the middle class was the most influential force in society reflected in Biedermeier; expressions of self-confidence, prosperity and family...

 with also images of everyday life, sometimes showing poverty but not necessarily to inspire change; examples of Waldmuller below....

(There is an old women carrying a back bundle shading under a tree..)

I liked the angular dynamic of the women, also reflected in the trees...

I wasn't sure why there was a Monet towards the end... other than it was purchased from a private collection in Vienna..beautiful though...

Moving towards the exit and garden..

That black slab of the building is noticeable from the garden....

Looking back....

I have all year to visit the lower Belvedere and Building 21... and now worried out the spits of rain...

My next objective was the Secession building designed by Joseph Olbrich, completed in 1898, to showcase exhibitions of Secessionist artists and architects.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secession_Building

Tortoises bearing the weight of the world on their shells....

Freeze by Gustav Klimt

The building has been heavily refurbished recently so I'm not sure if the exhibition space was always designed as a white space.. the missing ceiling panels allow the wire installations to be hung from above...

This is the current exhibition....' Would you say this is the day?'

I did sit down and try to understand.... I just found it impenetrable... and not the fault of the translation.  There was an animated man explaining the installations to a couple.. it must be my fault not being able to understand.... I appreciate installations that I can understand but when art criticism is wrapped up in a code that only a clique can recognise then I have to give up. Architectural criticism can be the same.. Pick up a copy of the Architectural Review and again you can read criticisms that only a handful of people understand the codes. 

One thing.. I bought an umbrella in the shop!... 
I didn't need to use it for the rest of the day, in fact, the sun came out. 
Only at 8pm did it rain and I was back by then. But if I hadn't.....

I walked past this shop...

A small bear... a small mortgage..? 

Finally I reached the Loos American Bar (completed in 1908).... with trousers on.. I walked in and everyone was in shorts...... The barman recognised me from yesterday, looked a little sheepish and carried on... The moral of the story.. just sit and ignore the waiter.. the power of money overcomes principles in this bar....

The wall line is where the columns are...

The room is approximately 6 x 4 m.. The use of mirrors on three sides does really work to make the room appear so much bigger. Mirrors are generally frowned on in 'serious' architecture..  but when done properly, by an Architect such as Adolf Loos, then it does work.

A word of warning..mind your head on the way down to the loo......