The author beside the painting of Helene Fourment (Peter Paul Rubens), Picture Gallery, Kunsthistorisches Museum

The Picture Gallery of the Kunsthistorisches Museum, developed from the art collections of the House of Habsburg (notably Rudolf II in the late-16th/early-17th century and Archduke Leopold Wilhelm in the mid-17th century), is one of the largest and most important of its kind in the world with numerous masterpieces from European art history.

Check out “Kunsthistorisches Museum“

Grablegung Christi (Tizan)

Ecce Homo (Tiziano Vecellio, 1543)

It occupies two wings of the first floor with one wing focusing on 16th-century Venetian painting (Titian, Paolo Veronese, Tintoretto, etc.), Spanish and French works and the other on Dutch painting (Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden, etc.), 17th-century Flemish painting (Peter Paul Rubens, Sir Anthony Van Dyck, etc.) and German Renaissance painting (Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, etc.).

John the Baptist Preaching (Bernardo Strozzi)

Mary with Child and Saints (Perugino)

The gallery includes the world’s largest collection of works by Pieter Brueghel the Elder, painted depictions of 16th century life which are unique worldwide and are an absolute joy.

The author (left) beside the painting of The Peasant Wedding of Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1568)

Tower of Babel (Pieter Bruegel)

The Massacre of the Innocents (Pieter Bruegel the Elder)

It features such famous works as the iconic The Tower of Babel (1563), The Fight Between Carnival and Lent (1559), Children’s Games (1560),  The Procession to Calvary (1564), The Gloomy Day (February-March, 1565), The Return of the Herd (October-November, 1565), The Hunters in the Snow (December-January, 1565), The Peasant and the Nest Robber (Bauer und Vogeldieb, 1568), The Peasant Wedding (1568/69) and The Peasant Dance (1568/69).

Madonna of the Meadow (Raphael)

Madonna and Child with Saints Catherine and James (Lorenzo Lotto)

Among the other highlights hanging in the hallowed museum walls of the Picture Gallery are its holdings of masterpieces of Europe’s greatest artists from the 15th, 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries such as:

• Jan van Eyck: Portrait of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati (c. 1431)
• Albrecht Dürer: Adoration of the Trinity(1511) and Portrait of Emperor Maximilian I (1519)
• Tintoretto: Susanna and the Elders (1555–56)
• Giuseppe Arcimboldo: Summer(1563)
• Antonello da Messina: San Cassiano Altarpiece(1475–1476)
• Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio: Madonna of the Rosary (1606/07), The Crowning with Thorns and David with the Head of Goliath
• Peter Paul Rubens: Ildefonso Altar (1630–32), The Miracles of St. Francis Xavier (1618) and The Fur (Portrait of his wife Hélène Fourment after emerging from the bath, partially wrapped in fur, 1638)
• Raphael: Madonna of the Meadow (1506)
• Rembrandt: Self Portrait (1652)
• Johannes Vermeer: The Art of Painting (1665/66)
• Diego Velázquez: Several portraits of the Spanish royal family, a branch of the Habsburg, sent to Vienna
• Hans Holbein the Younger: Portrait of Jane Seymour (1536/1537)

Homecoming of Hagar (Pietro da Cortona)

Hercules, Dejanira and the centaur Nesius (Paolo Veronese)

The paintings, though hanging in tall galleries, are more or less at eye level, making them easy to view from lovely upholstered sofas.

Cimon and Iphigenaia (Peter Paul Rubens)

The Four Rivers of Paradise (Peter Paul Rubens, 1615)

The protective rails feature accessible, individual descriptions in both German and English.

Bird hunting in Brussels (David Terniers, 1652)

Around 1890, Gustav Klimt, Ernst Klimt and Franz von Matsch painted the areas between and around the arches and columns on the north wall of the main staircase.

Advent … Elizabeth’s Moment (Luca Giordano)

The Triumph of Bacchus (Michaelina Woutiers)

Picture Gallery: First Floor, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Maria Theresien-Platz, 1010 Vienna. Tel: +43 1 525 24- 4902. E-mail: info.ansa@khm. Open Tuesdays – Sundays, 10 AM – 6 PM, Thursdays, 10 AM – 9 PM.

How to Get There: take U1 going to Leopoldau at Keplerplatz, transfer to U2 going to Aspernstrabe at Karlsplatz, exit at Volkstheater.