SCULPTURE

History

One of the first objects in this collection to arrive is the bust of the cathedral master builder Santino Solari, which was transferred to the museum from St. Peter’s Cemetery in 1844. The inventory grew in the nineteenth century, on the one hand through “cleansing” actions in churches and abbeys, which brought about the acquisition of numerous Gothic sculptures. On the other hand, urban expansion and the demolition of city fortifications, gates and buildings explain why many building fragments and marble coats of arms landed in the museum.

Collection range

The core sector of the collection consists in the extensive and high-quality holdings of Late Gothic sculpture. Later epochs are represented with some outstanding Baroque objects, also with a large quantity of objects that are more average in quality. The collection is not conceived as a quality collection but as documentation of sculptural works from the City and Land of Salzburg. The range extends from miniature portraits in plaster and wax to altars and monumental Baroque crucifixion groups and large-scale sculpture in the public space such as The Cardinal by Giacomo Manzú on Residenzplatz in Salzburg, the figure of St. Rupert in the fountain on the Behrens courtyard in St. Peter’s Abbey, also Paracelsus by Josef Zenzmaier, at present installed in front of the Celtic Museum in Hallein.

Inventory overview

Also in the collection are fragments of Gothic church accoutrements in the form of individual figures and architectural parts, as are seventeenth- and eighteenth-century figural sculptures. Fragments of building sculpture in the form of columns, bases and capitals range from the eleventh to the twentieth century. Several large stone coats of arms document the building activities of the Salzburg archbishops. Among the outstanding works beside Gothic sculpture such as the fragments of the so-called Emperor’s Monument by Hans Valkenauer are the model of a Marian column by Lukas von Hildebrandt, the Easter lamp from the cathedral by Johann Georg Hitzl, and the architectural and figural elements of the demolished outer Linzertor (gate) on Linzer Gasse.

Transparency and function

It is too little known that several monuments in the City of Salzburg belong to the inventory of the Salzburg Museum, for instance the coats of arms in the passages of the Mönchsberg garage. The collection documents the artistic activities of the archbishops and sovereigns with its portraits of Salzburg personalities, with the models for monuments and most of all with its many architectural fragments from across the centuries made of Untersberg and Adnet marble typical of Salzburg.

Image gallery

Strauchmüller Madonna, Hans Waldburger, 2nd quarter 17th c., wood, polychrome painting, inv. no. 1-65

Winged panel with Whitsuntide festivities, Andreas Lackner, ca. 1520, oil on wood, inv. no. 89-28

KaminHaus (Chimney House), Bernhard Gwiggner, 1986, polyester, inv. no. 1053-2011

Rauris Altar (overall view), 1490–1500, wood, gilded and painted, inv. no. 1088 BDS-91

Apotheosis of Archbishop Count Sigismund von Schrattenbach, ca. 1770, wood, parcel gilt, polychrome painting, ivory under glass plate, inv. no. 140-25

Tympanum with Enthroned Virgin Mary and Child, flanked by two angels with Banderoles, Adamo d'Arogno, ca. 1230, Untersberg marble, inv. no. 154-32

Guild cross of the millers, 1623, wood, carved, gilded, painted, inv. no. 176-43

Self-portrait of the stucco artist to the Court Peter Pflauder, Peter Pflauder, 2nd half 18th c., plaster, inv. no. 2622-49

Daphne, Dagobert Peche, 1917, wood (lime), polychrome original, on original base, Salzburg Museum (purchased with the help of the Committee for Salzburg Art Treasures and the City of Salzburg), inv. no. 1124-89

Romanesque crucifix, ca. 1200, lime wood, old painting (partly supplemented on beard and hair), inv. no. 1134 LS-2004

Zillis – The Göriach Bible, sculptural reproduction of the Romanesque ceiling in the church of St. Martin in Zillis, Switzerland, Bernhard Prähauser, 1992, pine wood, permanent loan from the Salzburg Museum Association, inv. no. 1173 a-g-2003

Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, called Paracelsus, Josef Zenzmaier, 2009, bronze, inv. no. 1407-2009

Portrait bust of the cathedral architect Santino Solari, 1st half 17th c., Untersberg marble, inv. no. 6043-49

Model of an unexecuted Marian column for Universitätsplatz in Salzburg, Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt, 1711/12, wood, polychromed, figures: wax, inv. no. 9229-49

Tomb cover in the form of a realistically shaped skeleton, Hans Conrad Asper, 1624, Untersberg marble, inv. no. 9240-49