KUNSTHISTORISCHES MUSEUM

Description

Essentials about the Kunsthistorisches Museum in brief

The Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM) (Museum of Fine Arts) is not only a must for art lovers when visiting Vienna. After all, the KHM is one of the largest and most important museums in the world and is visited by over one million people every year. The collection of the Kunsthistorisches Museum consists of art objects from seven millennia of history. Especially the painting galleries with works of countless European masters has world fame.

The building of the Kunsthistorisches Museum

Even from the outside, the imposing museum building, which is one of the most beautiful of its kind in all of Europe, is impressive. Together with its sister building opposite, which houses the Natural History Museum, the Kunsthistorisches Museum is one of the most important large historical buildings on Vienna’s Ringstrasse. Emperor Franz Joseph I commissioned the construction of the museum in 1857 in order to be able to present the imperial art collections in an appropriate, independent new building. However, more than 30 years passed until its completion in 1891.

The collections of the Kunsthistorischens Museum

Since then, the Kunsthistorisches Museum has housed art objects from seven millennia, from the time of Ancient Egypt to the end of the 18th century. Special emphasis is placed on Renaissance and Baroque art. The main building houses the Painting Gallery, the Vienna Kunstkammer, the Collection of Classical Antiquities, the Egyptian-Oriental Collection and the Coin Cabinet.

The Painting Gallery in particular, which exhibits works by Arcimboldo, Bruegel the Elder, Dürer, Michelangelo, Raphael, Rubens, Vermeer and Titian, among others, is world famous. In addition, there are collections of the KHM in the Neue Burg (Collection of Ancient Musical Instruments, Court Hunting and Armory Chamber, Ephesus Museum), in the Hofburg (Imperial Treasury) and in Schönbrunn Palace (Imperial Carriage Museum).