
Klimt Villa
From Summerhouse to Villa
In 1939 the Klein family, an assimilated Jewish middle-class family, was forced to flee Austria to escape Nazi persecution. After the liberation of Austria in 1945, the villa and some of the land that had been stolen from the Klein family were restored to it by the Republic of Austria. However, the family did not return to Hietzing and so sold the villa back to the Austrian state in 1957. After many years being used as a school, the villa remained empty for a long period of time, the fact that it had once housed Gustav Klimt’s last ever studio almost forgotten.


The Klimt Villa today
The revitalisation resulted in a detailed reconstruction of Gustav Klimt’s reception room and studio space. Today these are the main features of the exhibition at the Klimt Villa. In order to help visitors understand the special history of this location and the unique house-within-a-house structure, all guests are offered a short introduction in person before being given the opportunity to explore the spaces for themselves.
The garden, which features in several paintings by Klimt, is currently undergoing partial reconstruction in order to give visitors to the Klimt Villa an impression of the sumptuous flower garden that once surrounded Gustav Klimt’s studio.
Klimt Skulptur
Die vom Maler und Bildhauer Erwin Kastner geschaffene Skulptur wurde im Jubiläumsjahr 2022 auf der Südseite der Klimt Villa aufgestellt. Die Skulptur zeigt den Malerfürsten Gustav Klimt als Skizze und wirft im Laufe des Sonnenstandes seinen Schatten an die Fassade der Klimt Villa.

Die "Klimt Villa-Rose"
Gustav Klimt war ein Gartenfreund. Herzstück seines Gartens und auf Klimts Gemälde zu bewundern sind Damaszener-Rosen, die auf dem Grundstück um etwa 1900 gepflanzt worden sind. Die sogenannte Klimt Villa-Rose ist von einem Wiener Gartenexperten nachgezüchtet worden, dabei wurden die Triebe, die er von zwei Mutterpflanzen entwendet hat auf Wildrosen veredelt. 22 Stöcke sind im Zuge der Teilrekonstruktion des Gartens bereits ausgesetzt worden.
Jährlich stehen einige dutzend Stück zum Verkauf, mit dem Erlös wird die weitere Rekonstruktion des Klimt-Gartens finanziert.

Das Garten Café der Klimt Villa
An Schönwettertagen laden von Mai bis September Bistrotische im Schatten von herrlichen Kastanienbäumen im Garten der Klimt Villa zum Verweilen und zum Genuss von Kaffee und Kuchen ein. Das seit 2021 eröffnete Garten Café ist für Gäste während den Öffnungszeiten des Museums zugänglich und ermöglicht auch den Besuch des Gartens.
Nur bei Schönwetter, Mittwoch – Sonntag, sowie an Feiertagen 10 – 18 Uhr.


Exhibition
Klimt Lost
Especially in Vienna, but in fact all over the world, Klimt has come to seem ubiquitous. His art has become common property. What is forgotten is what has been lost in relation to his works and his life: stolen art, restored art, missing art, and countless stories about collectors, perpetrators and victims.
Klimt’s final studio can still be found within extensive gardens on the outskirts of Vienna. A single rosebush has survived here for all that time, nothing more. Klimt has been dead for over one hundred years. His collectors and patrons are also no longer alive. In many cases they were persecuted by the Nazis, robbed, driven into exile or murdered. Some of Klimt’s oeuvre was lost, burned or disappeared without trace. The rest no longer hangs in the salons of his collectors, but more often on the walls of museums. The everyday lives that were played out against the backdrop of his paintings are as lost to us now as the close, personal ties that once existed between owner and artwork.
The exhibition therefore asks questions about how to approach a loss that reaches far beyond the individual works of art. It also introduces a general public to some of the protagonists of both past and present day, and brings a new perspective to the lost Klimts.

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