A visit to the Secession Museum is a must for those following in the footsteps of Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) and Art Nouveau. The building itself is a flamboyant expression of the Art Nouveau style initiated by the Secessionists, with its impressive dome topped with golden leaves that beautifully marks the cityscape. The Secession Palace is particularly famous for housing Klimt's famous Beethoven Frieze.

Amasterpiece of Art Nouveau, this building has been dedicated to the defense of contemporary art since its origin. This remarkable space was conceived and financed, at the beginning of the 20th century, by secessionist artists as a manifesto in opposition to the academic art that was then presented by the neighboring Künstlerhaus. Deciding to break with the conservative and bourgeois current of historicism, these dissident artists wanted to defend and show the avant-garde current in which they were involved and which would later be called Art Nouveau, in German Jugendstil. At its head was the young Klimt, who coined the term Sezession in 1897 to mark this break with academic art and historism. At the same time, Klimt and Max Kurzweill founded the magazine Ver Sacrum, the official organ of the Viennese Secession, which lasted until 1903.

The architect Joseph Maria Olbrich, a student of Otto Wagner, designed the Secessionist Pavilion in 1898, before going into exile in Darmstadt. The building was designed in the pure Jugendstil style with its plant-inspired dome, which opponents of the Secession nicknamed the "cabbage". This roof sculpture is made of 3,000 laurel leaves arranged in a sphere and gilded with fine gold. It was renovated in the early 1980s through a private gift from the U.S. ambassador and his wife. On the pediment of the monumental entrance door, you can read the motto of the Secessionists: "To each age its art, to each art its freedom".

Inside, you will discover the sumptuous Beethoven Frieze , which is 34 meters long. This work was completed by the artist just in time for the Beethoven exhibition of 1902, a pictorial interpretation of the composer's 9th Symphony . A profusion of gold, mother-of-pearl, bright colors, angels and demons, force of evil, hymn to joy...

On the upper floors are programmed, on 1 000^m2, temporary exhibitions, platforms for contemporary artists, including Danh Vo, Carlos Bunga or Rana Hamadeh for the most recent.