A few days in Vienna - day 2

My second day in Vienna started with a big breakfast at Cafe Schwarzenberg. It is a beautiful and elegant place. One thing you would not see in Luxembourg: people having beakfast in a stylish cafe in the middle of a Wednesday morning. although I have to say that many of them looked like business people having a meeting or something.

I was disappointed once more by the snootiness of the waiters. Like being snob was a requirement to be a waiter in such a beautiful place, haha.

And again I had to think of Prague: the friendliness of the waiters there doesn't quite express itself in a manner you would expect either. However, they seem more bothered by their clients than snob there, haha.

I had the time to make a quick sketch of the place and later added shadows with a pencil I bought in MAK the previous day.

The piano was calling to me: Sketch me! Sketch me!

After gaining strength from my delicious breakfast, I went to the Belvedere, where Klimt's Kiss is exhibited.

I first visited the lower Belvedere and the temporary Emil Nolde exhibition they had at the time. I knew of the artist, but not much, so it was really interesting to discover his art. I fell in love with one of his paintings, Meer III.

I had a short break on a bench with a direct vue of the upper Belvedere, which I quickly sketched, and a nice chat with an old lady sitting next to me and admiring the vue. She told me it was the first time she saw the Belvedere with snow. Lucky me!

Groups of children were passing by and telling me I made nice drawings :)

The upper Belvedere is bigger than the other one and has a big variety of art and other items. There was even one room with stuffed animals. I don't really like those, but the strange bird attracted me and I continued sketching other animals.

There was also a stuffed tiger, but the look on its face was so sad and strange that I couldn't bring myself to even try to sketch it.

The fierce hyena was more interesting

The upper Belvedere not only hosts a few of Klimt's nicest works, but also very beautiful paintings by Egon Schiele. Not the usual nudes you would think of when talking about the artist, but, in my opinion, more interesting works.

I completely fell in love with Die Umarmung (The embrace), for example, and had to sketch it. The colours I added later are not at all like the original painting, though.

Call me crazy, but I actually like Schiele's embrace it more than Klimt's kiss

I had lunch at the Belvedere's Menagerie. A small pink cafe with huge portraits of Sissi and Frank Joseph.

There was a group of Asian women at a table nearby. They looked both cute and funny, specially the older lady, so I quickly sketched them. I don't think they noticed me.

To my horror, my nice Hiro pen went dry in the middle of the process, so I continued with a Pentel brushpen. I added colour later.

I think they were Chinese

In the afternoon I searched for the butterfly house. Yes, I go to Vienna, not to see Sissi's palace, but to see butterflys, haha. Unfortunately, when I finally found it, it was almost closing time, so I decided to postpone it to the following day.

And anyway, the Sacher Stube, where the famous Sacher Torte comes from, was in the area and also an item on my list, so I went there instead.

Another very cute place, where the friendly waitress was dressed as a soubrette. I am amazed at the number of cute pink walls I see in cafes around Vienna.

The blonde woman was smoking an electronic cigarette very stylishly. I didn't think that was possible.

I finished the day at the Albertina where I found an exhitibion of paintings from various periods, from Monet to Picasso it was called.

I'm not particularly a fan of Monet, not in the strictest sense, but I really enjoyed a painting of a pond of waterlilies. The sky was mirrored in it so wonderfully, I was quite in awe.

Most rooms at the Albertina were closed because of the humidity. However, one room with beautiful statues of the muses was accessible, so I quickly scribbled their names and drew their major characteristics for future reference. I think I should have written down what they stand for as well, for there are a few ones I don't remember already. Oh well, there's always Google for that.

The statues were much more beautiful, I assure you, haha