The Secession Building () is a contemporary art exhibition hall in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

, Austria. It was completed in 1898 by Joseph Maria Olbrich as an architectural manifesto for the

Vienna Secession The Vienna Secession (; also known as the Union of Austrian Artists or ) is an art movement, closely related to Art Nouveau, that was formed in 1897 by a group of Austrian painters, graphic artists, sculptors and architects, including Josef Ho ...

, a group of rebel artists that seceded from the long-established fine art institution.

Description

The building features the Beethoven Frieze by

Gustav Klimt Gustav Klimt (14 July 1862 – 6 February 1918) was an Austrian symbolist painter and a founding member of the Vienna Secession movement. His work helped define the Art Nouveau style in Europe. Klimt is known for his paintings, murals, sket ...

, one of the most widely recognized artworks of Secession style (a branch of

Art Nouveau Art Nouveau ( ; ; ), Jugendstil and Sezessionstil in German, is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and ...

, also known as Jugendstil in Germany and Nordic countries). The building was financed by Karl Wittgenstein,Monk, ''Ludwig Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius'': p.8 the father of

Ludwig Wittgenstein Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. From 1929 to 1947, Witt ...

. The motto of the Secessionist movement is written above the entrance of the pavilion: "To every age its art, to every art its freedom" (). Below this is a sculpture of three

gorgons The Gorgons ( ; ), in Greek mythology, are three monstrous sisters, Stheno, Euryale, and Medusa, said to be the daughters of Phorcys and Ceto. They lived near their sisters the Graeae, and were able to turn anyone who looked at them to stone ...

representing painting, sculpture, and architecture. The building has been selected to figure on the national side of the €0.50 Austrian coin. It also appears as the main motif of one of the Austrian gold collectors' coins: the 100 euro Secession commemorative coin, minted in November 2004, on the obverse side. The reverse depicts a detail from the Beethoven Frieze, which is housed in the building. The Secession building is currently an artist-run

kunsthalle A kunsthalle () is a facility that mounts temporary art exhibitions, similar to an art gallery. It is distinct from an art museum by not having a permanent collection. In the German-speaking regions of Europe, ''Kunsthallen'' are often operated ...

centred around international contemporary art.

Images

File:Wien - Secessionsgebäude.JPG, The Secession Building in 2017 File:Wiener Secessionsgebäude.jpg, Secession Building façade File:Secession Detail Blattwerk.JPG, Foliage work detail File:Jugendstil owls - Koloman Moser - Detail facade of Secession Building - Vienna.jpg, Jugendstil owls on the façade by Koloman Moser File:Gustav Klimt - Beethovenfries, "Die Sehnsucht nach dem Glück" (nach Richard Wagners Interpretation der IX. Sinfonie von Ludwig van Beethoven) - 5987 - Österreichische Galerie Belvedere.jpg, The Beethoven Frieze, created by

, is housed in the lower floor. File:Viennasecessiongorgons.jpg, Painting, Architecture, and Sculpture File:2004 Austria 100 Euro Secession front.jpg, The Secession commemorative coin

Influences

'' Young Poland'' () was a

modernist Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

period in Polish visual arts,

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

and

music Music is the arrangement of sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm, or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Music is generally agreed to be a cultural universal that is present in all hum ...

, covering roughly the years between 1890 and 1918 during

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...

. Many of the exhibitions were held at the Palace of Art, also known as "Secession", of the Kraków Society of Friends of Fine Arts, in Krakow Old Town.

References

External links

Art Nouveau collections Art museums and galleries in Vienna Buildings and structures in Innere Stadt Art museums and galleries established in 1897 1897 establishments in Austria Art Nouveau architecture in Vienna Art Nouveau museum buildings Buildings and structures completed in 1898 19th-century architecture in Austria {{Europe-art-display-stub