Young Athlete & City Hall

The bronze statue "The Young Athlete" in front of the Theseus Temple in Volksgarten and the City Hall in the background last Sunday late in the afternoon. It wasn't as chilly as it looks in this photo.

Man in a Boat

The Kunsthistorisches Museum is currently presenting the sculpture "Man in a Boat" by Australian artist Ron Mueck at the Theseustempel. The work was created during a residency at the National Gallery, London, in 2000/2. Mueck's sculptures faithfully reproduce the minute detail of the human body, but in considerably smaller or larger than life size. "Man in a Boat" has a little naked man (about half life-size) sitting at the front of a real (full-sized) rowing boat.  He is middle-aged and paunchy, his arms folded as he peers into the distance, his eyes evading any contact with the viewer. Deprived of oars, he has no way of controlling the course of his battered old boat and faces an uncertain future.   

Volksgarten in Winter

Volksgarten is one of three parks in the very city center of Vienna (the other two are Burggarten and Stadtpark) and I often take a stroll there. The Theseus Temple always catches my eyes. The building in the background is the City Hall.

Theseus Temple #3

My last Sunday afternoon walk led me to the Volksgarten and the still immaculate white Theseus Temple.

wisdom? peace? blank? all of this?

The recently refurbished Theseus Temple serves now as the venue for a new series of exhibitions of the Kunsthistorisches Museum (Museum of Fine Arts): returning the building to its original function, each show presents a single seminal work by a contemporary artist. Currently the temple houses an old, gnarled olive tree, cast by the Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone from a two-thousand-year-old living tree in southern Italy and then painted white. The show "wisdom? peace? blank? all of this?" runs through June, 24. Click here for a short video in german.

Theseus Temple #2

When I recently passed by the beautifully renovated Theseus Temple in Volksgarten, I couldn´t resist taking another photo. In the background you can see the spire of the Minorite Church.

The Young Athlete

This bronze statue of a young athlete (1921) by Josef Müllner is located in front of the Theseus Temple in Volksgarten. With the current iciness he must be freezing...

Theseus Temple #1

The Theseus Temple, located in Volksgarten and created by Peter von Nobile from 1819 to 1823, is a smaller copy of the Temple of Hepheastus in Athens, Greece. Until 1890 the temple housed a sculpture of Theseus by Antonio Canova that can now be found at the Kunsthistorisches Museum (Museum of Fine Arts). After some years of renovation the temple is now gleaming in new splendor.