Category Archives: Vienna

Winter as a Child, Again

It is just over a year since I started my blog. I decided to revisit my very first post, written when I was getting ready to travel to Vienna for the Christmas markets, the concerts and the museums–and of course the apple strudel. Now I’m lucky enough to be leaving again for Vienna, one of my very favorite places. Here’s to discovering new places and revisiting old ones! A year ago, I wrote:

Travel is not just about being there. Travel is about memory and anticipation. As I pack my one small suitcase for Vienna in November, I am full of memories of past trips and high hopes for this one.

: Lady Caroline Scott as Winter; image from Commons Wikimedia

Last year, the Vienna Kunsthistorisches Museum had a special exhibit: “Winter Tales.” Paintings, sculpture and artifacts from all over the world were gathered in a glorious celebration of winter. My very favorite piece was this portrait of a child with a fur-and-velvet muff and a scruffy little dog impatient for her to play: “Lady Caroline Scott as Winter,” by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Winter is so often personified as Death, or as a creaky old man. Here, though, winter is a child full of hope and wonder. She gazes out at us from the barren winter grounds of her British home, her face as fresh as the day she was painted in 1776 at the age of two or three.

This is not a glamorous society portrait. It is only about 57 x 45 inches (just the right size to place over my fireplace, if I could afford such a thing!) I can imagine the artist Sir Joshua Reynolds, age 51 at the time, encountering Lady Caroline in the bare winter grounds of her home. Anyone would be captivated by her rosy-cheeked face and direct gaze. I can see Sir Joshua dashing off a sketch and finishing the portrait back in his studio. It would have made a nice break from painting his more demanding adult subjects, who proudly posed with the emblems of their wealth and power: swords, globes, weighty books, jewels and fine silks.

The British Peerage tells us that Lady Caroline was the daughter of the 3rd Duke of Buccleuch. She married the 6th Marquess of Queensberry (slightly lower in rank than a Duke, but who’s keeping score?) She had 6 surviving children and lived to the age of 80. So she was an exact contemporary of Jane Austen, although Jane died at age 41. I’d like to think Lady Caroline read Jane’s books.

Lady Caroline was a privileged child. As she grew up, no doubt she learned that many children were cold and dirty and hungry. Her rank would come with some responsibilities to take care of the less fortunate. She lived through the American Revolution, the Terror in France, and the Napoleonic Wars. And we all know that even for the most privileged, life holds heartbreak and disappointment. But on this wintry day, all that is in the future. In this perfect moment, Lady Carolin stands on her sturdy little legs, happy to be walking about in the wide world.

Vienna is an enchanting city in any season, but my favorite time there is winter. The Christmas season begins in late November, an ideal time for crowd-free travel. I do not have a fur muff or a scruffy little dog, but I am setting off for Vienna with all the anticipation of a child at Christmas.

Moonwalk with Ludwig

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“King Ludwig II of Bavaria,” Ferdinand Piloty, 1865, Public Domain

Ludwig II of Bavaria identified with Louis XIV, the Sun King of France. (In German, Ludwig is the same name as Louis). The trouble was, the French King Louis XIV actually was an absolute monarch who expanded and presided over quite a large and powerful empire.

Louis XIV by Rigaud, Public Domain

Louis XIV was also a warrior. He actually led his own forces in the battlefield. Ludwig? Not so much. And he had little interest in the day-to-day work of government. Ludwig was a monarch of the kingdom of Bavaria, which was much smaller and less powerful than France. Through no real fault of Ludwig’s, Bavaria was more or less eaten up by Germany, under Kaiser Wilhelm I of Prussia, during his reign. But while Bavarian independence lasted, Ludwig was a much-loved monarch of a proud independent kingdom.

He visited Versailles early in his reign. When he came home, he decided to build a dream home–or maybe two or three or four dream homes. Linderhof Palace, where he actually spent a lot of time, was designed as a mini-Versailles-for-one. It is in French Rococo style and has any number of references to the Sun King, including this ceiling medallion in the main entry.

But Ludwig called himself the Moon King. He often stayed up all night and slept all day. He was fond of moonlit sleighrides. Pulled by four white horses, he rode in solitary splendor, enjoying the spectacular Bavarian landscape of mountains, foothills and farms.

During these forays into the countryside, he would often stop and visit with the locals, who adored him. His life was lonely, but by all accounts at least some of his servants and a few of his peers became loyal and trusted friends. The movie Ludwig, directed by Luchino Visconti, touchingly describes some of these friendships, which lasted to the untimely end of Ludwig’s life.

Michael Jackson in Vienna, Austria, 1988, Zoran Veselinovic, Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike

If I had to make a modern comparison, I would compare Ludwig IV to Michael Jackson. I would not want to offend fans of either man by carrying the comparison too far. But both of them were romantic, idealistic, talented, misunderstood, and wildly famous but still lonely. Both of them died far too early in mysterious circumstances. And both died accompanied only by their physicians. Sometimes the past can help us understand the present.

Join me next time for more explorations in the art and history of Europe!

Nurturing Genius

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One of my most unforgettable sights in a museum was a young child crouched on the floor of the Musee Picasso in Paris. As her mother waited nearby, the little girl moved from one Picasso painting to another, intently drawing in a notebook. She was oblivious to anything around her, and people respectfully stood back to let her work. What she was doing WAS work, not play. Was she a budding genius, or just a kid going through a stage, as kids will? Hard to tell, but I applaud her mom for patiently spending the day letting this child pursue her passion.

In his essay on Gianlorenzo Bernini, Simon Schama describes what happened when Bernini’s father, a sculptor himself, took the boy to visit the Pope:

Brought before the Borghese Pope Paul V, the eight-year-old did a shrewdly ingratiating lightning sketch of Saint Paul “with free bold strokes” that moved the astonished Pope to hope that he was looking at the next Michelangelo. To nurture his talent, Paul V appointed Cardinal Maffeo Barberini to watch over the young Bernini and shape his education.

Years of what all sculptors had to do – study and draw from classical models – followed. Even boy wonders had to learn the rules.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2006/sep/16/art

Art education is not just for boy wonders. It’s for all of us. Imagine being a child lucky enough to take art classes at the Louvre! It happens every day, there and at other centers of art.

And every day, in every great museum, aspiring artists old and young set up their easels in front of masterpieces, in order to learn from the masters. This artist is copying The Peasant Wedding, painted in 1567 by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. It’s in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.

We all have just a little touch of genius inside us. Maybe I’d better get out my own easel and paints today!

The Musee Picasso, located in a 17th century mansion in the Marais district, is under renovation. Its long-anticipated reopening is in summer of 2013.

Join me next time for more adventures exploring the art and history of Europe.

Snow and Strudel

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One of the great pleasures of Austria is strudel, both sweet and savory. A very popular restaurant in Old Town Innsbruck is ALL, strudel, all the time: the Strudel-Cafe Kroll. It is not always easy to find vegetarian meals in Austria, so we jumped at the chance to have spinach and cheese strudel for lunch in a charming small cafe.

Of course the classic apple strudel is served everywhere in Austria, with a choice of either warm vanilla sauce or or a small mountain of whipped cream–or both. The truly decadent can always add a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

What about snow? The holiday season in Vienna starts toward the end of November, when the Christmas markets open, sparkling lights go up all over the city, and beautiful music fills the churches and concert halls. In the past, we’ve been lucky enough to wake up to a city frosted with snow.

This year? We shall see. We may not be lucky enough to have snow, but for sure there will be strudel.

Winter as a Child

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Travel is not just about being there. Travel is about memory and anticipation. As I pack my one small suitcase for Vienna in November, I am full of memories of past trips and high hopes for this one.

Lady Caroline Scott as Winter; image from Commons Wikimedia