The target of the day was “all things modern” in the art world of Vienna, or at least the two main museums. Exiting the subway at the "Museum Quartier", the impressive architecture of the back side of the museum of natural history definitely sets the tone.
Down the street is the grand Parliament building.
Walking past the front façade of the Museum of Natural history may be an equally impressive site to the government house.
But, my aim was this graphite colored modern structure, hidden in the courtyard of the Museum Quartier. Without even viewing the collection, the building in and of itself demanded respect and attention.
Inside there was an open six stories of elevators and catwalks (four up, two down). The mechanisms of the elevators were buffed to a bright chrome finish.
With everything exposed by the glass casing, form and shape had already been introduced. As usual, no pictures were allowed of the exhibits, but I would definitely recommend the venue.
Outside, people made good use of the sculpted benches.
Two blocks away from the Museum Quartier is the Burg-Albertina garden, with two important statues. The first is of course the musical genius Mozart, complete with treble clef sign at his feet.
And the second is Goethe. He seems to vi for the attention of the Viennese, as his likeness is well represented, even without paying a Faustian ransom for the multiple venues.
Vienna is another town where it pays to simply look up and enjoy the visual surprises.
A trip to Vienna would not be complete without at least walking by the opera house. Since the restoration geniuses in Italy used blowtorches to remove ages old lacquer from the seating and managed to burn down, La Scala, formerly the most important stage in Opera, the Vienna Opera house may have a legitimate claim as one of the premier remaining edifices.
Walking back to the hostel, there was a particularly interesting sign mechanism. Similar to using pixilation dots of light to spell words, someone had decided to drop water in pixels to spell words. It was captivating to watch the words fall to the ground and disapate, even if they were in reverse from this angle.
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