Vienna Exhibition Explores Three Secession Movements

A major exhibition at the Wien Museum in Vienna examines the three distinct Secession movements that emerged in Munich, Berlin, and Vienna at the end of the 19th century. The show, curated by Niccolò Lucarelli and running until October 13, centers on key figures Gustav Klimt (Vienna), Max Liebermann (Berlin), and Franz von Stuck (Munich). It features over 80 artists, including Segantini, Zorn, Pissarro, and Monet, alongside archival materials such as posters, catalogues, issues of Ver Sacrum and Simplicissimus, and other publications. The Secession movements arose as a reaction against established artist societies and state academies, advocating for aesthetic quality, novelty, and professional standards. The Munich Secession, founded in 1892, was the first and served as a model for the others, even influencing the founding of the Venice Biennale in 1895. The Berlin Secession notably admitted women, with Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Baluschek, and Heinrich Zille developing a socially critical realism that later inspired the New Objectivity. The Vienna Secession uniquely included architects from the start, integrating architecture with painting and sculpture. Klimt's work, influenced by Freud and Schnitzler, focused on psychological portraiture, particularly of women, in an atmosphere of pre-war anxiety. The exhibition also highlights themes of spring, eroticism, and societal transformation, including industrialization and women's changing roles.