The Oberes Belvedere houses the nineteenth and twentieth centuries’ collection of the Österreichische Galerie (Austrian Gallery). Although the emphasis is on Austrian painters, works by famous non-Austrians such as Van Gogh, Renoir, Monet, and Caspar David Friedrich are also on display. The more interesting parts of the collection are the Historicism, Realism, and Impressionism sections usually displayed on the first floor. Although the Classicism, Romanticism, and Biedermeier sections on the second floor have excellent works, these genres, not unjustifiably, seem to be of lesser interest to the general public.

The Belvedere’s role in Austrian history is not confined to the days of Prince Eugene. On 15 May 1955, the end of the occupation of Austria by the four allied powers was confirmed here and the Austrian Republic declared in the Marble Hall. Visiting in mid May 2005, one might have expected a special exhibition to commemorate this event, and one would not have been disappointed. Visiting in the last week of April, preparations for such exhibition were in full swing and half the museum was closed.

The closed parts usually contain the works that most people travel to the Belvedere to see: the Historicism, Realism, and Impressionism sections, which include the fin de siecle works by Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, and Egon Schiele. To make up for the disappointment, a selection of the more famous works was on display on the ground floor – no reduction in admission price was offered. On display were works by amongst others Schiele, Kokoschka, Munch, Renoir, Monet, and Van Gogh.

The highlight, of course, was the works by the Viennese-born Gustav Klimt. One room had six large paintings, mostly nature scenes with very bright colors. The Kiss, arguably his most famous and most powerful work was in an adjacent room. I was surprised by the physical size of the work – the two figures are life size. This image is omnipresent in Vienna – on posters, postcards, t-shirts, coffee mugs, mouse pads, fridge magnets – I came back from changing the baby to discover we owned one. We even had a poster of The Kiss hanging in the lounge of our rental apartment.

I was not surprised to have found the Classicism, Romanticism, and Biedermeier sections of lesser interest. We spent only a few minutes in these rooms before heading for the small museum café. The cake to order here is the Belvedere Torte – a chocolate-nut cake with marzipan icing. We complemented it with an Esterházy Torte – a white cake with five layers of cake separated by icing and topped with marzipan – named after the very prominent Hungarian noble family that stayed loyal to the Habsburg emperors. Although the cakes and great coffee somewhat made up for the disappointment of the closed galleries, I still felt somewhat robbed. My wife felt doubly so – our toddler gobbled up three quarters of her cake.