The “From Vienna to Rome. Masterpieces of the Habsburgs from the Kunsthistorisches Museum” exhibit at Rome’s Palazzo Cipolla, March 5th, 2026

Rome’s central Palazzo Cipolla is currently hosting until July 5^th, 2026 the exquisite exhibit, “From Vienna to Rome.  Masterpieces of the Habsburgs from the Kunsthistorisches Museum”.

 
Directly from Vienna’s renowned Kunsthistorisches Museum fifty works of art are currently on display in Rome.  The exhibit includes paintings from famous masters such as Rubens, Velázquez (and his “Infanta Margarita in a Blue Dress”), van Dyck, Brueghel the Elder, Titian, Tintoretto and one of THE greatest Italian painters of all time, Michelangelo Merisi, aka Caravaggio, and his stupendous “Crowning of Thorns” (which had been painted in Rome in 1603-1605 but currently hangs in Vienna at the Kunsthistorisches Museum).

Caravaggio!

 
From the late Middle Ages to the Baroque period, Habsburg emperors and archdukes collected exotic and uncommon materials to which they often ascribed magical powers, such as precious stones, ostrich eggs and shark teeth.  From these natural products artists then created their magnificent works of art.

 
The Rome exhibit brings together works collected or commissioned by the Habsburgs, restoring the image of a multiethnic and multicultural empire that used art as a tool for cultural representation, the dissemination of knowledge and the dialogue between civilisations.

The Hendrik Christian Anderson Museum of Rome

The Hendrik Christian Anderson Museum was built between 1922 and 1925.  Anderson was a Norwegian-American sculptor, painter and urban planner. 

In 1893 Andersen travelled to Europe to study art and eventually settled in Rome.   His museum is located near Rome’s Piazza del Popolo (at Via Pasquale Stanislao Mancini 20) and was designed by Anderson himself.  He bequeathed his home, studio, papers and more than 400 pieces of his work to the Italian Government.

The museum opened to the public on December 19^th, 1999 on the 50^th anniversary of Anderson’s death.  He wanted the Neo-Renaissance style building to house a museum so that everyone could admire his works and projects...which in his lifetime had not been appreciated enough.