Eugene de Blaas | Academic /Genre painter

Eugene de Blaas also known as Eugenio De Blaas or Eugen von Blaas, was born on July 24th in the Italian village of Albano, near Rome in 1843, to Austrian parents.

His career was enriched by a talented and artistic family.

His father, Carl von Blaas (1815-1894), was one of the most notable portrait painters of Roman society, a successful history portrait and fresco painter of the late Biedermeier period.

Johann Strauss | Morning Papers, Op 279 | Viennese waltz

Morgenblätter (Morning Papers), Op. 279, is a Viennese waltz composed by Johann Strauss II (1825-1899) in 1863 and first performed on 12 January 1864 at the Sofiensaal in Vienna.

The work's genesis was attributed to the composition of a waltz by Jacques Offenbach later titled "Abendblätter" when Offenbach dedicated his work to the influential Vienna Authors' and Journalists' Association (Presseclub Concordia).

Camille Claudel | La valse, 1889-1905

Leopold Pollak | Genre painter

Leopold Pollak (1806-1880), was an Austrian genre and portrait painter.

Born in Bohemia as the son of a Jewish merchant. Pollak showed an early talent for painting.

In 1819, he enrolled at the Prague Academy of Fine Arts, where he studied for five years under the Director of the Academy, Joseph Bergler.

He continued his studies in Vienna with Johann Peter Krafft.

Mozart: "A little night music", 1787

Eine kleine Nachtmusik (Serenade No. 13 for strings in G major), K. 525, is a 1787 composition for a chamber ensemble by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791).

The German title means "a little night music" and is one of Mozart's most famous works.

The serenade is written for an ensemble of two violins, viola, cello, and double bass, but it is often performed by string orchestras.

Paquita

Paquita is a ballet in two acts and three scenes originally choreographed by Joseph Mazilier to music by Édouard Deldevez and Ludwig Minkus.

Paul Foucher received royalties as librettist.

Paquita is the creation of French composer Édouard Deldevez and Paris Opéra Ballet Master Joseph Mazilier.

Sergiy Lyacevitch | Dancing flower

Radetzky March

The "Radetzky March", Op. 228, is a march composed by Johann Strauss (Senior) which was first performed on 31 August 1848 in Vienna to celebrate the victory of the Austrian Empire under Field Marshal Joseph Radetzky von Radetz (the piece's namesake) over the Italian forces at the Battle of Custoza, during the First Italian War of Independence.

Mozart | Concerto for Flute and Harp | 1 - Allegro

Mozart wrote the "Concerto for Flute, Harp, and Orchestra in C major" in April 1778, during his seven-month sojourn in Paris.

It was commissioned by Adrien-Louis de Bonnières, duc de Guînes (1735-1806), a flutist, for his use and for that of his eldest daughter, Marie-Louise-Philippine (1759-1796), a harpist, who was taking composition lessons from the composer, at the duke's home, the Hôtel de Castries.

Mozart stated in a letter to his father that he thought the duke played the flute "extremely well" and that Marie's playing of the harp was "magnifique".

Louis-Ernest Barrias (1841-1905) | Mozart child with a violin, 1887 | Musée Fabre

Ave Maria (Schubert)

"Ellens dritter Gesang" ("Ellens Gesang III", D. 839, Op. 52, No. 6, 1825), in English: "Ellen's Third Song", was composed by Franz Schubert in 1825 as part of his Op. 52, a setting of seven songs from Walter Scott's 1810 popular narrative poem The Lady of the Lake, loosely translated into German.

Giovanni Battista Salvi called Sassoferrato (1609-1685) | The Madonna in prayer | Christie's

Johann Strauss | By the Beautiful Blue Danube

"The Blue Danube" is the common English title of "An der schönen blauen Donau", Op. 314 / German for "By the Beautiful Blue Danube", a waltz by the Austrian composer Johann Strauss II (1825-1899), composed in 1866.

Originally performed on 15 February 1867 at a concert of the Wiener Männergesang-Verein (Vienna Men's Choral Association), it has been one of the most consistently popular pieces of music in the classical repertoire.

Its initial performance was considered only a mild success, however, and Strauss is reputed to have said:

"The devil take the waltz, my only regret is for the coda - I wish that had been a success!"

Mihály Zichy | Ball in the Concert Hall of the Winter Palace during the Official Visit of Nasir al-Din Shah in May 1873-1874 | State Hermitage, St. Petersburg

Cecil van Haanen | Genre painter

Cecil van Haanen (1844-1914) was a Vienna-born Dutch portrait and genre painter, whose significant work was centred at Venice.

Van Haanen was the son to landscape painter Remigius Adrianus Haanen (1812–1894) and Emilie Mayer von Alsó-Rußbach.

He received early artistic training from his father and Friedrich Schilcher, and from April 1854 was educated at the pre-school of the Vienna Academy under Peter Johann Nepomuk Geiger.

Stefan Zweig | The World of Yesterday: Memories of a European / Il mondo di Ieri, 1942

Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) was an Austrian writer.

At the height of his literary career, in the 1920s and 1930s, he was one of the most widely translated and popular writers in the world.

The World of Yesterday: Memoires of a European (German title Die Welt von Gestern: Erinnerungen eines Europäers) is the memoir of writer Stefan Zweig.

It has been called the most famous book on the Habsburg Empire.

He started writing it in 1934 when, anticipating Anschluss and Nazi persecution, he uprooted himself from Austria to England and later to Brazil.

He posted the manuscript, typed by his second wife Lotte Altmann, to the publisher the day before they both committed suicide in February 1942.

The book was first published in the original German-language by an anti-Nazi Exilliteratur publishing firm based in Stockholm (1942), as Die Welt von Gestern.

It was first published in English in April 1943 by Viking Press.

In 2013, the University of Nebraska Press published a translation by the noted British translator Anthea Bell.

In "The World of Yesterday", Stefan Zweig states:

"We of the new generation who have learned not to be surprised by any outbreak of bestiality, we who each new day expect things worse than the day before, are markedly more skeptical about a possible moral improvement of mankind.

We must agree with Freud, to whom our culture and civilization were merely a thin layer liable at any moment to be pierced by the destructive forces of the "underworld".

Caspar David Friedrich | Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, 1818 | Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg

Egon Schiele | Quotes / Poems

• "Art cannot be modern. Art is primordially eternal".

• "Bodies have their own light which they consume to live: they burn, they are not lit from the outside".

• "I must see new things and investigate them. I want to taste dark water and see crackling trees and wild winds".

• "At present, I am mainly observing the physical motion of mountains, water, trees and flowers. One is everywhere reminded of similar movements in the human body, of similar impulses of joy and suffering in plants..."

• "I was in love with everything- I wanted to look with love at the angry people so that their eyes would be forced to respond; and I wanted to bring gifts to the envious and tell them that I am worthless.".

Anton Romako | Genre painter

Anton Romako was an Austrian painter.

Romako painted a large number of landscape scenes (for example from the Bad Gastein), influenced by the Barbizon school, but is known mostly for his portraits and historical scenes.

His early works display the influence of Biedermeier realism, while the late works are painted in a nervous expressionist style which disturbed his contemporaries.

Il Valzer | La danza proibita

Avvicinati al tuo partner, conta "Uno, due, tre, Uno, due, tre" nella tua testa e vai!

Anche se nel XVII e XVIII secolo, il valzer era considerato la radice di tutti i mali, si è fatto strada tra le élite ed è oggi il più popolare di tutti i balli da sala.

A causa della sua presa ravvicinata e delle rotazioni veloci, un tempo il valzer veniva chiamato la "danza proibita".

Camille Claudel | La Valse, 1891

Emanuel Baschny (Austrian, 1876-1932)

Emanuel Baschny was an Austrian painter, draftsman, graphic artist, etcher.

Born: Sternberg - Czech Republic, Europe in October 3, 1876.

Death: Vienna, Vienna, Austria, Europe in November 1, 1932.

From 1893 studied at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts under Franz Rumpler and William Unger.

Mozart: "The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between"

• "A man of ordinary talent will always be ordinary, whether he travels or not; but a man of superior talent will go to pieces if he remains forever in the same place".

• "Un uomo di talento ordinario sarà sempre ordinario, che viaggi o no; ma un uomo di talento superiore andrà in pezzi se rimane per sempre nello stesso posto".

• "Melody is the essence of music".

• "La melodia è l'essenza della musica".

Barbara Krafft | Portrait of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1819 (detail)

Carl Schweninger | Genre painter

Carl Schweninger the Younger (1854-1912) was an Austrian painter.

Carl Schweninger was born in Vienna, Austria and came from a Viennese artist family.

He was the son of the painter Carl Schweninger the Elder (1818-1887) and brother of the painter Rosa Schweninger (1818-1918).

Angelica Kauffmann | Neoclassical painter

Angelica Kauffmann (1741-1807) was a painter in the early Neoclassical style who is best known for her decorative wall paintings for residences designed by Robert Adam.

The daughter of Johann Joseph Kauffmann, a painter, Angelica was a precocious child and a talented musician and painter by her 12th year.

Her early paintings were influenced by the French Rococo works of Henri Gravelot and François Boucher.

Désiré Thomassin | Naturalist painter

Désiré Thomassin was an Austrian painter and composer.

His father was the charge d’affaires of the Duchy of Parma in Vienna, his mother was from Regensburg.

After the death of the father in 1867 the remaining family moved to Regensburg.

There he finished his school and attended the local lyzeum for two terms till 1878.

Then he studied music in Munich under Josef Rheinberger (composition) and Max Hieber (violin).

Eduard Veith | Symbolist painter

Eduard Veith (1858-1925) was an Austrian portrait painter and stage designer.

Many of his works were influenced by Symbolism.

He was born to the decorative painter, Julius Veith (1820-1887), and his wife Susanna, née Schleif (1827-1883).

At first, he received training to follow in his father's profession.

Later, he went to Vienna, where he took classes at the Museum of Applied Arts from Professor Ferdinand Laufberger.

He capped off his studies by creating sgraffito for exhibition buildings at the Exposition Universelle in Paris.

He then returned home, where he assisted his father with painting churches, synagogues and other ceremonial buildings.

This was followed by several study trips; to Italy, Belgium and Tunisia.

He finally settled in Vienna; becoming a free-lance artist and working mostly by commission.

From 1890, he was a member of the Vienna Künstlerhaus.

In 1896, he received a gold medal at the Große Berliner Kunstausstellung.

In 1905, he was appointed a Professor at the University of Technology.

In 1911, he married Bertha Griesbeck (1872-1952), from Augsburg.

He later taught at the University of Applied Arts Museum of Applied Arts, and became a Professor there in 1920.

During his years in Vienna, he maintained contact with his home town, and held exhibitions there.

In addition to his paintings, he did interior decorations for a number of the buildings on the Ringstraße, and trompe l'oeil stage sets.

He often collaborated with the architects, Fellner and Helmer, who built dozens of theatres and opera houses throughout the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

He died shortly before his sixty-seventh birthday, and was interred at Döbling Cemetery.

His grave is adorned with a sculpture by Georg Leisek. | Source: © Wikipedia

Eduard Veith (1858-1925) è stato un pittore di genere, ritrattista, scenografo e professore universitario Austriaco.

Molte delle sue opere furono influenzate dal Simbolismo.

Nacque dal pittore decorativo Julius Veith (1820-1887) e da sua moglie Susanna, nata Schleif (1827-1883).

Inizialmente ha ricevuto una formazione per seguire la professione di suo padre.

Successivamente si recò a Vienna, dove prese lezioni al Museo delle Arti Applicate dal professor Ferdinand Laufberger.

Ha coronato i suoi studi creando graffiti per gli edifici espositivi dell'Exposition Universelle di Parigi.

Tornò poi a casa, dove aiutò il padre a dipingere chiese, sinagoghe ed altri edifici cerimoniali.

Seguirono numerosi viaggi di studio; verso Italia, Belgio e Tunisia.

Alla fine si stabilì a Vienna; diventando un artista freelance e lavorando principalmente su commissione.

Dal 1890 fu membro del Künstlerhaus di Vienna.

Nel 1896 ricevette una medaglia d'oro alla Große Berliner Kunstausstellung.

Nel 1905 fu nominato professore presso l'Università della Tecnologia.

Nel 1911 sposò Bertha Griesbeck (1872-1952), di Augusta.

Successivamente insegnò al Museo di Arti Applicate dell'Università di Arti Applicate e lì divenne professore nel 1920.

Durante i suoi anni a Vienna mantenne i contatti con la sua città natale e vi tenne mostre.

Oltre ai suoi dipinti, realizzò decorazioni interne per numerosi edifici sulla Ringstraße e scenografie trompe l'oeil.

Collaborò spesso con gli architetti Fellner and Helmer, che costruirono decine di teatri e teatri d'opera in tutto l'impero austro-ungarico.

Morì poco prima del suo sessantasettesimo compleanno e fu sepolto nel cimitero di Döbling.

La sua tomba è ornata da una scultura di Georg Leisek. | Fonte: © British Wikipedia