Monat: Jänner 2024

The Simmering crematorium with its urn grove and later extensions in the 11th district was built in 1922 as the first Austrian crematorium directly opposite the central cemetery. The facility with influences of German sacred architecture is considered one of the most famous buildings by the Austrian architect Clemens Holzmeister.

The construction was based on a municipal council resolution under the first democratically elected mayor of Vienna, Jakob Reumann, and was preceded by a controversy with the Christian-socialist federal government until the Constitutional Court ruled in favor of the crematorium. Until the Second Vatican Council in 1963, cremation was still considered forbidden by the Catholic Church. More than 7,000 cremations are carried out there every year, and the adjacent cemetery contains around 42,000 graves and a pet cemetery.

Clemens Holzmeister, born in Tyrol in 1886 with Brazilian citizenship (his father had previously emigrated to South America), is considered one of the most important and internationally renowned Austrian architects of the 20th century. His work, comprising around seven hundred buildings, is characterized by the immense creative power of his 60 years of activity, particularly in Austria, Germany, Turkey and Brazil.

The listed and recently renovated Villa Schmutzer in the Cottage Quarter in the 18th district was commissioned by Prof. Ferdinand Schmutzer in 1909/10 and built in country house style by the innovative Viennese Art Nouveau architect Robert Oerley.

Schmutzer came from a family of artists; his great-grandfather founded the „k.k. Kupferstecher-Academie“ in Vienna, a building block of the later founded „k.k. Academy of the United Fine Arts“. Like his grandfather and father, he started out as a sculptor and then studied painting at the academy.

Schmutzer was extremely successful as a portraitist of Viennese society: his contemporaries included Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein, his neighbor Arthur Schnitzler, Emperor Franz Josef I and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, and the villa of Ferdinand and his wife Alice was a meeting place of cultural Vienna.

The equestrian statue of Emperor Joseph II from 1807 on Josefplatz in the 1st district was commissioned by his nephew Emperor Franz II/I from the sculptor Franz Anton Zauner and is modeled on the Roman statue of Marcus Aurelius on the Capitol in the Palace of the Conservators in Rome. In addition to the exemplary style of the model, the Roman emperor also plays a role in Vienna in terms of content, as he is said to have died near Vienna.

The bronze cast was made in the imperial canon foundry on Wieden and was considered the largest cast outside France at the time. The statue stands on a pedestal made of polished Mauthausen granite, which features reliefs and medallions with scenes of trade and agriculture.

A model of the statue from 1797 can be found in Schönbrunn Palace Park.