Baroque Churches of Vienna
The Splendours of Austrian Religious Architecture
Mozart's music finds its reflection in the fine baroque interiors of Vienna's churches. Take a trip into baroque style at the zenith of the Habsburg empire.
Vienna goes back to the Romans, but it took a long time to hit its stride. It was just a middling city in the Middle Ages. During the Renaissance, it was held back by the threat from Turkish invasions. Finally, at the very end of the seventeenth century, it burst forth into a glorious summer of baroque architecture – and its churches are perhaps the most striking and enjoyable aspect of that baroque style.
Vienna Takes its Cue from Rome
Vienna always looked to Rome as an example, partly because of the immense prestige of Italian art and architecture, but also because the Habsburg emperors saw their capital as in some ways a ‘second Rome’. The Dominican church, built in the 1630s, borrows the conventional early baroque façade from Maderno’s Roman churches, with a fine pediment, curly volutes at the sides, and no towers. The interior mixes frescoes with fine stucco decoration; it’s almost like being inside a wedding cake with white icing everywhere!
The Jesuit church of 1623 also follows Roman precedents. A huge single naved space, it’s clearly based on the church of the Gesu. It also follows its Roman mother church in the richness of its decoration, with pink and green marble, gilt, and fine frescoes.
The dome is particularly worth seeing – as it’s an optical illusion. And here again the church follows Roman precedent, becase artist Andrea Pozzo had already created a similar illusion in the Jesuit church of Sant’Ignazio in Rome.
Just a bit later than these two churches is the Servitenkirche of 1651. It was founded by Ottavio Piccolomini, an Italian general who had fought for the Emperor in the Thirty Years War. The Servitenkirche brings the elliptical plan to Vienna for the first time. Again it’s likely Vienna borrowed from Rome – the model here being Borromini’s San Carlino.
Italian architects, as well as Roman models, dominated the first generation of baroque architecture in Vienna. The façade of the Am Hof church, for instance, is distinctly Italian with its fine dynamic feeling – not surprising as it was designed by Carlo Antonio Carlone.
But towards the end of the seventeenth century, Austrian architects started to take over. Both Hildebrandt and Fischer von Erlach had studied in Rome, but they developed their baroque architecture in a distinctly Austrian way.
St Peter’s was designed by Hildebrandt. The façade is dramatic. The two towers are set out at an angle, and the centre is concave, creating an effect of depth. Inside, the church is oval, under a fine dome with frescoes by the leading Austrian baroque painter, Johann Michael Rottmayr.
The latest of the baroque churches is St Michael’s – unlike the others, a refurbishment of a much older church. You can still see the Gothic vault in the choir, and part of the Romanesque church. The altarpiece, though, is the apotheosis of the Baroque. In swelling clouds, St. Michael pursues the fallen angels, while above, the eye of God looks down on the scene.
Imperial Baroque
But the crowning glory of Vienna’s baroque churches is the Karlskirche, by Fischer von Erlach. It’s a highly eclectic building which borrows concepts from Borromini and Bernini, as well as from the architecture of the Roman Empire. The portico reflects the Pantheon in Rome, while the two huge columns are modelled on Trajan’s Column in the Roman Forum. And somehow Fischer managed to weld all these influences together to create something quite unforgettable.
Inside, there are more fine frescoes by Rottmayr in the dome. But the centrepiece is a masterly variation by Fischer on Bernini’s famous cathedra in St. Peter’s, Rome, an altarpiece lit from behind by a tiny high-up window.
