Jump to navigation Jump to content Jump to contact Jump to search Jump to search Jump to footer

The Museum

The Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien is one of the foremost museums in the world, with rich holdings comprising artworks from seven millennia - from Ancient Egypt to the late 18th century. The collections of Renaissance and Baroque art are of particular importance.

Functions and organisation

Together with the Weltmuseum Wien and the Theatermuseum, the Kunsthistorisches Museum forms the KHM-Museumsverband, Austria's largest museum association.

The association is a scientific institution under public law with full legal capacity and is under the supervision of the Federal Chancellor of the Republic of Austria, which is exercised by the Federal Minister for Art, Culture, the Civil Service and Sport. With around 150 curators, conservators and restorers, it is one of the largest and most important non-university research organisations in Austria.

Management

Jonathan Fine, Ph.D.
Director General of the KHM-Museumsverband
 
Dr. Paul Frey
General Manager

 

Advisory Board

Dr. Ulrike Baumgartner-Gabitzer (Chairwoman)
Dr. Brigitte Borchhardt-Birbaumer (Deputy Chairwoman)
Dr. Andreas Brandstetter
Dr. Barbara Damböck
Dipl.Ing. Judith Engel MBA, MSC, MSc
Mag. Veronika Höfenstock 
MMag. Dr. Thomas Kohlert
Mag. Marianne Novotny-Kargl
Dr. Rudolf Scholten

Business report

You can find detailed information on the diverse activities of the KHM Museums Association in our current annual report. (in German)

Geschäftsbericht 2023

The collections

The Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien’s extensive holdings are on show at different locations.
A diverse group of three individuals is exploring an art museum. One person, a woman with curly hair and glasses, gazes thoughtfully at a painting while holding a smartphone. The others, a person in a beanie and a woman in a green sweater, are also engaged with their devices.

The building on Ringstrasse houses the Picture Gallery, Kunstkammer Wien, the Collection of Greek and Roman Antiquities, the Egyptian and Near Eastern Collection and the Coin Collection.

Other collections of the Kunsthistorisches Museum are housed in the Neue Hofburg (i.e. the Collection of Historical Musical Instruments, the Imperial Armoury, and the Ephesus Museum), in Hofburg Palace (the Treasury), and in Schönbrunn Palace (the Collection of Historical Carriages)

Sustainability

The climate crisis and its effects on biodiversity are one of the greatest challenges facing us today. We now have the chance to make an impact, take measures, communicate solution strategies.

Read more

History

Das Bild zeigt eine kunstvoll gestaltete Decke mit einem Doppeladler-Wappen in der Mitte. Das Wappen ist rot mit einem weißen Feld, umgeben von detaillierten floralem Design und goldenen Elementen. Es vermittelt ein Gefühl von historischer Pracht und Symbolik.

Planning of the Ringstrasse began in 1857 and included the project to bring together and show the imperial collections in a grand new building featuring state-of-the-art technical and display facilities; it took, however, another ten years until the competition to design the new museums was actually held. The architects who participated in 1867 were Hansen, Löhr, Ferstel and Hasenauer, all of whom worked in Vienna. When jury and patron failed for months to agree on a winner, Gottfried Semper, the internationally-renowned architect known for his museum designs, was called in as an advisor in 1868. The Emperor then decided to commission Semper to alter and complete the plans initially presented by Hasenauer. But he also enlarged them – his designs were informed by urban planning in ancient Rome – to create what was known as the “imperial forum”: He envisaged an additional – also symmetrical - pair of buildings aligned with the two museums, each of which featured a semi-circular façade. These two buildings were to flank the Hofburg’s Leopoltinische Trakt (the wing of the old palace erected under Emperor Leopold) for which Semper planned a modern façade and that would house the throne room. However, only the two museums and the part of the “Neue Burg” (new palace) facing the Burggarten (palace garden) were realised.

Work on the museums commenced in 1871

Twenty years later, in 1891, they were formally opened to the public. Semper had moderated Hasenauer’s original design for the façades and they now feature a complex art-historical programme of sculptures and reliefs. The building’s internal structure combines two architectural traditions: entrance hall, staircase and cupola hall form a dramatic unit that celebrates the imperial patron and his predecessors. An additional elegant feature is the circular opening in the ceiling of the entrance hall that offers visitors their first glimpse of the cupola hall. Ascending the stairs, visitors pass Antonio Canova’s “Theseus Slaying the Centaur” on their way to the cupola hall, the apex of imperial display. Along this central axis a wealth of neo-baroque decorations create one of the most solemn and splendid interiors of late-nineteenth-century Vienna, probably unrivalled in any other European museum.

More Ways to Explore