Sorry to be so far behind in updates, but that should be a sign of how busy our long days are! So here it is Saturday night and I am just doing Wednesday! We started (after sleeping a bit late) with the metro over to the Art / History Museum, which is a work of art in itself (nice little staircase, eh?). Beyond impressive, loaded with Caravaggio's, Ver Meer's, you name it... and the world's largest collection of Bruegel, one of Ida's (and our) favorite artists. We saw the (in)famous Tower of Babel and more, including several of the Seasons series. Then we had a nice walk over to the Secession building (original home of one of Vienna's more dynamic art movements, from early in the 20th century), culminating in sitting a spell on what Ian called "the coolest place in Vienna," the front steps (Ian's proclamation was based on observation of a hipster wearing Maison Martin Margiela sneakers!) Across the street was an outdoor market/cafe/food store complex called Naschmarkt, where Alex met us for a great outdoor lunch. Then our excellent Vienna Tour Guide drove us all the way out to the 14th District (a hilly green suburb) where we found the amazing (truly amazing) church that Secessionist designer Otto Wagner built, the Kirche am Steinhof. Done in spectacular Jugendstil/Art Nouveau style, Glenn pronounced this the most beautiful modern church he had ever seen: see one exterior and one interior shot. (Music in services must be... interesting... we counted a full 7-second reverb!) On the way back downtown we stopped at Schonnbrun Palace, which is embedded in an enormous park (emu's abounded in the woods), and had coffee on a terrace outside this "little" outbuilding, the Glorietta: sunny skies and 65 degrees at least. Alex dropped us off at the apartment where we changed into dressier clothes in order to go to the Staatsoper production of Elektra, which can only be described as jaw-dropping and stunning. Ninety minutes of constantly intense and propulsive music, with fine singing from a group of characters ravaged by the passions of murder and vengeance. Wow. No photo would do this full justice, so accept at least as a token of our respect one of the cast's curtain calls. To recover, we went across the street to the famous Sacher Hotel for a late-night snack and of course Sacher torte, enjoyed by our sharply-dressed Ian. The decor was... shall we say, opulent (see photo of the lobby)? And then home to bed, again thanks to our wonderful host, concierge, and driver, Alex!
No comments:
Post a Comment