Top 10 Museums in Austria
Pinning a national museum ranking to ten institutions is always partly arbitrary, but the ten below would feature on most informed lists of the country's most important museums. They cover the breadth of period, medium, and curatorial approach that distinguishes the leading museum nations.
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
Opened 1891 in a Ringstrasse palace by Semper and Hasenauer, the Kunsthistorisches Museum holds the world's largest Bruegel concentration — Hunters in the Snow, The Tower of Babel, the Peasant Wedding — alongside Vermeer's The Art of Painting and Raphael's Madonna of the Meadow.
Belvedere, Vienna
The Upper Belvedere holds Gustav Klimt's The Kiss (1907-08), the most reproduced Austrian painting. Klimt's Judith, Schiele's portraits, and major Kokoschka and Makart works fill the nineteenth and early-twentieth century rooms.
Albertina, Vienna
The Albertina holds one of the world's greatest drawing collections: over a million prints and 65,000 drawings, including Dürer's Young Hare and Praying Hands. The Batliner collection adds Monet, Picasso, Chagall, and Rothko upstairs.
MuseumsQuartier, Vienna
Behind the Imperial Stables, the MuseumsQuartier holds the Leopold Museum (Schiele's largest concentration), the mumok (Museum Moderner Kunst), and the Kunsthalle Wien.
Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna
Opposite the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Naturhistorisches Museum holds the 29,500-year-old Venus of Willendorf and one of the world's most important meteorite collections.
Sigmund Freud Museum, Vienna
Freud's apartment and consulting rooms at Berggasse 19, where he practised from 1891 until his 1938 emigration. The famous couch is in London; the rooms preserve much else.
Schloss Schönbrunn
The Habsburg summer palace's State Rooms operate as a museum of court life, with the Imperial Carriage Museum (Wagenburg) in the former stables.
Mozart's Birthplace, Salzburg
Mozarts Geburtshaus at Getreidegasse 9, where Mozart was born in 1756, holds his childhood violin, family portraits, and original manuscripts.
Museum der Moderne, Salzburg
On the Mönchsberg with panoramic views of Salzburg, the Museum der Moderne holds strong post-war Austrian photography and painting.
Ars Electronica Center, Linz
The Ars Electronica Center in Linz, dedicated to art-technology intersections, runs the annual Ars Electronica festival and operates a Deep Space immersive projection environment.
These ten do not exhaust the country's museum landscape — every list of this kind makes painful omissions — but they offer a credible foundation for a serious museum trip.
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