Belvedere, Art museum in Landstraße, Vienna, Austria
The Belvedere is an art museum in Landstraße, Vienna, Austria, housed in two Baroque palaces linked by formal gardens with decorative pools and fountains. The terraced green spaces rise over stone staircases from the lower to the upper building and offer views of symmetrical flowerbeds and sculptures.
Prince Eugene of Savoy had Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt design the Belvedere as a summer residence, completed in 1723. In 1776 Empress Maria Theresa and Joseph II decided to move the imperial gallery from the Stallburg into the Upper Belvedere, and from 1781 parts of the imperial collection were shown there. In 1891 the paintings were transferred to the newly opened Kunsthistorisches Museum.
The museum's name comes from the Italian belvedere, meaning a fine view, and the Upper Palace's staterooms still look out over the gardens toward the city. The collection's core is the world's largest holding of Gustav Klimt paintings, with The Kiss (1908/09) and Judith (1901) shown in the rooms devoted to art around 1900.
Visitors can explore three separate venues: the Upper Palace for historical art, the Lower Palace for temporary exhibitions and the Belvedere 21 for contemporary works. The walk between the two main buildings passes through the garden and takes about ten minutes on foot.
The museum's collection began with donations from the Vienna Secession, whose members, led by Carl Moll, had pressed for years for a state museum of contemporary art. Their gifts formed the founding stock of the Moderne Galerie opened in the Lower Belvedere in 1903.
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