Verkehrte Welt am Hasenhaus in Wien

Ein Vorschlag zur Kontextualisierung und Zuschreibung der Fassadenmalerei an Heinrich Vogtherr den Älteren

Abstract

In the following article, I suggest to take a new look at an important property in Renaissance Vienna, more precisely at its façade painting. Although the building has been demolished almost 300 years ago, its extravagant exterior has repeatedly aroused the interest of historians and art historians. The appearance of its façade, which was elaborately repainted around 1550, is only attested to by a watercolour by Salomon Kleiner, painted shortly before the building was demolished in 1749. In addition to an interpretation of the painting’s content, this article is also the first attempt to assign the façade painting to a specific painter and his workshop: Heinrich Vogtherr the Elder. It can be shown that he was able to build on older decorative campaigns for the execution of the façade painting, but also used ideas and pictorial formulas from his own diverse production of prints.