Klimt's The Kiss
Real gold leaf on a canvas about a metre and a half square โ Austria's most famous painting, and standing before it you see why.
C.Stadler/Bwag โ CC BY-SA 4.0 ยท Derbrauni โ CC BY 4.0 ยท Derbrauni โ CC BY 4.0 ยท Derbrauni โ CC BY 4.0
The Upper without hesitation: it has The Kiss, the permanent collection and the view. The Lower is worth it only if its temporary show interests you.
Personal photography without flash is generally allowed in the permanent collection, though some temporary exhibitions prohibit it โ check the sign at each room's entrance.
Ninety focused minutes covers the Upper Belvedere; three hours with the garden and Lower palace. Enter by the lower gate and walk up through the garden โ the finest approach.
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Two baroque palaces separated by a descending terraced garden, built by Prince Eugene of Savoy, the empire's commanding general, in the early eighteenth century. The Upper was for ceremony and display, the Lower was where he actually lived โ and the difference is obvious at a glance. Today the Upper Belvedere holds the world's most important collection of Austrian art, and at its centre Gustav Klimt's The Kiss: two figures wrapped in real gold leaf, in a room that is always crowded, where you understand instantly why the image became a global icon. Around it hang Schiele, Kokoschka, Monet and Van Gogh. The garden between the two palaces is free and open to all, and it gives one of Vienna's finest sights: stand at the Upper palace and look down over the fountains to the Lower one with the city's spires ranged behind it. Canaletto's famous view of Vienna was painted from exactly this spot.
Real gold leaf on a canvas about a metre and a half square โ Austria's most famous painting, and standing before it you see why.
From the Upper palace you look down the falling garden over all of Vienna โ Canaletto's exact angle.
Beside Klimt hangs some of Schiele's harshest, most honest work โ the opposite of gold, and arguably stronger.
Prince Eugene's private reception room, its painted ceiling a reminder that this was a home, not a museum.
Prinz-Eugen-Straรe, Vienna