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hazelnut_cafeIn response to
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/07/29/nude.art.ap/index.html
... which contains a link to an article about a museum in Vienna that has opened its doors (for the summer) to scantily clad and nude visitors wanting to see their (air conditioned) exibition of "The Naked Truth," early 1900s erotic art.
VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- Vienna's prestigious Leopold Museum is usually a pretty buttoned-down place, but on Friday, some of the nudes in its marble galleries were for real.
Scores of naked or scantily clad people wandered the museum, lured by an offer of free entry to "The Naked Truth," a new exhibition of early 1900s erotic art, if they showed up wearing just a swimsuit -- or nothing at all.
With a midsummer heat wave sweeping much of Europe, pushing temperatures into the mid-90s Fahrenheit (mid-30s Celsius) in Vienna, the normally staid museum decided that making the most of its cool, climate-controlled space would be just the ticket to spur interest in the show.
Peter Weinhaeupl, the Leopold's commercial director, said the goal was twofold -- help people beat the heat while creating a mini-scandal reminiscent of the way the artworks by Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Oskar Kokoschka and others shocked the public when they first were unveiled a century ago.
"We wanted to give people a chance to cool off, and bring nakedness into the open," he said. "It's a bit of an experiment. Egon Schiele was a young and wild person in his day. He'd want to be here."
Most of those who showed up in little or no attire Friday opted for swimsuits, but a few hardy souls dared to bare more. Among them was Bettina Huth of Stuttgart, Germany, who roamed the exhibition wearing only sandals and a black bikini bottom.
Although she used a program at one point to shield herself from a phalanx of TV cameras, Huth, 52, said she didn't understand what all the fuss was about.
"I go into the steam bath every week, so I'm used to being naked," she said. "I think there's a double morality, especially in America. We lived in California for two years, and I found it strange that my children had to cover themselves up at the beach when they were only 3 or 4 years old. That's ridiculous."
For years, the Austrian capital has been known for a small but lively nudist colony on the Donauinsel, an island in the middle of the Danube River where people disrobe, often startling the unsuspecting joggers, cyclists and rollerbladers who happen upon them.
Overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Austria has always been somewhat more conservative than many other European countries. The Viennese were scandalized when native art nouveau masters like Klimt -- best known for his sensuous "The Kiss" and the subject of an upcoming film starring John Malkovich -- began producing works that some critics panned as "indecency," "artistic self-pollution" and borderline pornography.
The 180 works on display at the Leopold through Aug. 22 include Klimt's "Nude Veritas," an 1899 painting of a naked young woman with wildflowers in her hair, and Schiele's "Two Female Friends," a 1915 rendition of two nude women entangled in each other's arms.
Max Hollein, director of Frankfurt's Schirn Kunsthalle art museum, likened the public uproar at the time to "the visible outcry at the live transmission from last year's Super Bowl when, for a few seconds, CBS broadcast shots of the singer Janet Jackson's exposed nipple."
Mario Vorhemes, a 20-year-old Vienna resident who strode into the Leopold on Friday wearing nothing but a green and black Speedo, was nonchalant.
"What's the big deal?" he asked. "We're born naked into this world. Why can't we walk around in it without clothes from time to time?"
Elina Ranta, a fully clothed tourist from Finland who checked out the art -- and the audience -- left amused.
"I thought, 'This is strange. How is this possible in a museum?"' Ranta said. "We've been in many galleries and I've never seen people walking around like this."
"In English, my name means 'beach,"' she added. "That's pretty funny under these circumstances, isn't it?"
Copyright 2005
I looked up some of the artists mentioned, because I like pervy scandals and am also learning figure drawing in art class...
Paintings/sketches I like or want to copy into my sketchbook to show my art teacher:
Gustav Klimt:
The Kiss 1907 - 08 (Of course.)
Stoclet Frieze : Expectation (I liked her posture, the way the shapes in her dress affect the overall visual effect, and I loved the background.)
Schlob Kammer on the Attersee IV (Lovely house with a nice feeling to it.
After the Rain
Apple Tree I
Beethoven Frieze :'Freude schöner Götterfunken' (detail) The
Chruch in Cassone (I have a blue fetish.)
Chruch in Unterach on the Attersee
Emilie Flöge at the age of seventeen
Farmergarden with Sunflower (This style vaguely reminds me of the way one of my friends used to draw.)
Garden Path with Chicken (Because the chicken looks self-righteous, and that makes me grin.)
Goldfish
Houses in Unterach on the Attersee
Lady with Cape (It has feeling to it.)
Lady with Fan
Malcesine on Lake Garda (!!!)
Music I
Poppy Field
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I ('nother nifty-shapes-dress.)
Portrait of Baroness Elisabeth Bacchofen-Ech (I like her dress, too.)
Portrait of Margaret Stonborough-Wittgenstein
Portrait of Serena Lederer (Really sort of translucent and ghostly...)
Portrait of the pianist and piano teacher Joseph Pembauer
Schlob Kammer on the Attersee II, Schlob Kammer on the Attersee IV
Seated Nude Woman, Study (I like the way her hair wraps around her shoulders, and her shy little feet.)
Stoclet Frieze : Fullfilment (Reminiscent of The Kiss.)
Stocletfrieze : Life Tree
Study for "Lewdness" from the Beethoven Frieze (What a sly expression! Hooray for handsome androgeny!)
Water Serpents I (A little Very scary, but it the same time very cool. Posture reminds me of The Three Ages of Women.)
http://www.expo-klimt.com/1_3.cfm?ID=629826183
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/07/29/nude.art.ap/index.html
... which contains a link to an article about a museum in Vienna that has opened its doors (for the summer) to scantily clad and nude visitors wanting to see their (air conditioned) exibition of "The Naked Truth," early 1900s erotic art.
VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- Vienna's prestigious Leopold Museum is usually a pretty buttoned-down place, but on Friday, some of the nudes in its marble galleries were for real.
Scores of naked or scantily clad people wandered the museum, lured by an offer of free entry to "The Naked Truth," a new exhibition of early 1900s erotic art, if they showed up wearing just a swimsuit -- or nothing at all.
With a midsummer heat wave sweeping much of Europe, pushing temperatures into the mid-90s Fahrenheit (mid-30s Celsius) in Vienna, the normally staid museum decided that making the most of its cool, climate-controlled space would be just the ticket to spur interest in the show.
Peter Weinhaeupl, the Leopold's commercial director, said the goal was twofold -- help people beat the heat while creating a mini-scandal reminiscent of the way the artworks by Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Oskar Kokoschka and others shocked the public when they first were unveiled a century ago.
"We wanted to give people a chance to cool off, and bring nakedness into the open," he said. "It's a bit of an experiment. Egon Schiele was a young and wild person in his day. He'd want to be here."
Most of those who showed up in little or no attire Friday opted for swimsuits, but a few hardy souls dared to bare more. Among them was Bettina Huth of Stuttgart, Germany, who roamed the exhibition wearing only sandals and a black bikini bottom.
Although she used a program at one point to shield herself from a phalanx of TV cameras, Huth, 52, said she didn't understand what all the fuss was about.
"I go into the steam bath every week, so I'm used to being naked," she said. "I think there's a double morality, especially in America. We lived in California for two years, and I found it strange that my children had to cover themselves up at the beach when they were only 3 or 4 years old. That's ridiculous."
For years, the Austrian capital has been known for a small but lively nudist colony on the Donauinsel, an island in the middle of the Danube River where people disrobe, often startling the unsuspecting joggers, cyclists and rollerbladers who happen upon them.
Overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Austria has always been somewhat more conservative than many other European countries. The Viennese were scandalized when native art nouveau masters like Klimt -- best known for his sensuous "The Kiss" and the subject of an upcoming film starring John Malkovich -- began producing works that some critics panned as "indecency," "artistic self-pollution" and borderline pornography.
The 180 works on display at the Leopold through Aug. 22 include Klimt's "Nude Veritas," an 1899 painting of a naked young woman with wildflowers in her hair, and Schiele's "Two Female Friends," a 1915 rendition of two nude women entangled in each other's arms.
Max Hollein, director of Frankfurt's Schirn Kunsthalle art museum, likened the public uproar at the time to "the visible outcry at the live transmission from last year's Super Bowl when, for a few seconds, CBS broadcast shots of the singer Janet Jackson's exposed nipple."
Mario Vorhemes, a 20-year-old Vienna resident who strode into the Leopold on Friday wearing nothing but a green and black Speedo, was nonchalant.
"What's the big deal?" he asked. "We're born naked into this world. Why can't we walk around in it without clothes from time to time?"
Elina Ranta, a fully clothed tourist from Finland who checked out the art -- and the audience -- left amused.
"I thought, 'This is strange. How is this possible in a museum?"' Ranta said. "We've been in many galleries and I've never seen people walking around like this."
"In English, my name means 'beach,"' she added. "That's pretty funny under these circumstances, isn't it?"
Copyright 2005
I looked up some of the artists mentioned, because I like pervy scandals and am also learning figure drawing in art class...
Paintings/sketches I like or want to copy into my sketchbook to show my art teacher:
Gustav Klimt:
The Kiss 1907 - 08 (Of course.)
Stoclet Frieze : Expectation (I liked her posture, the way the shapes in her dress affect the overall visual effect, and I loved the background.)
Schlob Kammer on the Attersee IV (Lovely house with a nice feeling to it.
After the Rain
Apple Tree I
Beethoven Frieze :'Freude schöner Götterfunken' (detail) The
Chruch in Cassone (I have a blue fetish.)
Chruch in Unterach on the Attersee
Emilie Flöge at the age of seventeen
Farmergarden with Sunflower (This style vaguely reminds me of the way one of my friends used to draw.)
Garden Path with Chicken (Because the chicken looks self-righteous, and that makes me grin.)
Goldfish
Houses in Unterach on the Attersee
Lady with Cape (It has feeling to it.)
Lady with Fan
Malcesine on Lake Garda (!!!)
Music I
Poppy Field
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I ('nother nifty-shapes-dress.)
Portrait of Baroness Elisabeth Bacchofen-Ech (I like her dress, too.)
Portrait of Margaret Stonborough-Wittgenstein
Portrait of Serena Lederer (Really sort of translucent and ghostly...)
Portrait of the pianist and piano teacher Joseph Pembauer
Schlob Kammer on the Attersee II, Schlob Kammer on the Attersee IV
Seated Nude Woman, Study (I like the way her hair wraps around her shoulders, and her shy little feet.)
Stoclet Frieze : Fullfilment (Reminiscent of The Kiss.)
Stocletfrieze : Life Tree
Study for "Lewdness" from the Beethoven Frieze (What a sly expression! Hooray for handsome androgeny!)
Water Serpents I (
http://www.expo-klimt.com/1_3.cfm?ID=629826183
