Search
    • media_content.tooltip.skipped

    Wachau Valley. Shaped by an Invisible Hand

    Between Krems and Melk, the Danube has created one of the most beautiful regions in Austria. No wonder that the Wachau Valley is, and always has been, a favorite motif of landscape painters.

    The director of the Landesgalerie Niederösterreich is standing in front of a monumental, eight metres wide painting by Anton Hlavàček called „Panorama des Donautals mit der Ruine Dürnstein” (Panoramic view of the Danube Valley with Dürnstein castle). The painting was commissioned in 1906 for an exhibition in Milano, where Lower Austria wanted to advertise. So Hlavàček, a Viennese landscape painter, chose the most beautiful panoramic vista in the Wachau Valley as his subject: Dürnstein in the foreground and the vineyards, the woods and the Danube in the back. Today, we shoot commercial videos. A hundred years ago, it was paintings such as this one that made people decide to travel.

    Look at the perspective, the colour, the beauty of the landscape. Of course, people were fascinated. Of course, they wanted to see this with their own eyes. 

    State Gallery of Lower Austria Krems, director Christian Bauer / Landesgalerie Niederösterreich - State Gallery of Lower Austria
    media_content.tooltip.skipped
    Christian Bauer, Director Landesgalerie Krems
    Vineyards of Wachau
    media_content.tooltip.skipped

    There are not many places in the world in which one can say that humans have made them more beautiful. The Wachau Valley is one of them. Ancient Romans already settled in the Danube Valley in the area between the towns of Krems and Melk and began to cultivate the land. The mild microclimate and fertile soil created by the river as well as plenty of sunshine attracted settlers throughout many eras to come.

    They erected castles and built villages. They added monasteries and planned cities. Created a truly unique cultural landscape. Drive through the Wachau Valley today and you get the feeling that everything is part of a greater Gesamtkunstwerk: the hills and villages, peach orchards and vineyards, woods and fields, and in the middle of it all, the Danube.

    Wachau - Dürnstein Castle
    media_content.tooltip.skipped

    The Wachau has already been the subject of paintings in the Middle Ages, says Christian Bauer, „but at the beginning of the 19th century, interest increased significantly.” Artists came from Vienna by carriage and painted Krems, Stein, Göttweig and Dürnstein - there was no shortage of motifs. “Who can do justice to the views one can enjoy during a boat ride on the Danube,” wrote Carl Ehrenfried Dreyßig, “where one prospect crowds out the next!” 

    It was not until the 1870s that the beauty of the Wachau Valley became truly famous. The capital of the Habsburgs seemed too loud and incredibly hectic for many - but out here, along the Danube, time seemed to stand still. Back then, there was no train leading to the valley, and the Danube steamers did not stop here either. One small village after another had seemingly fallen into a slumber, castles had crumbled, with ivy covering the ancient walls. The Wachau Valley seemed like a landscape right out of a fairy tale. Full of motifs for artists in search of a touch of Romanticism shortly before the dawn of a new era.

    It was painters such as Robert Russ, Emil Jakob Schindler and aforementioned Anton Hlavàček, which made the Wachau Valley famous around the world. Their works can be seen until April 2022 in a special exhibition at the Kunsthalle Krems. Their paintings did not just carry a specific image of the Wachau into the world, they also changed the perception locals had of themselves. It often happens that one is blind to the beauty of one's immediate surroundings because it is such a normal, everyday occurrence. When the Wachau Valley became famous and visitors from all over the globe came to see with their own eyes what they knew from paintings and posters, locals started to see their homeland with different eyes, too.

    •                         State Gallery of Lower Austria in Krems / Landesgalerie Niederösterreich - State Gallery of Lower Austria
      media_content.tooltip.skipped
    •                         State Gallery of Lower Austria Krems, director Christian Bauer / Landesgalerie Niederösterreich - State Gallery of Lower Austria
      media_content.tooltip.skipped
    •                         State Gallery of Lower Austria in Krems / Landesgalerie Niederösterreich - State Gallery of Lower Austria
      media_content.tooltip.skipped

    Slowly, people started to take pride in the beauty of their country, as well as in the hard labour that went into cultivating fields and vineyards and wine cellars, and which had hitherto been little valued. This pride spurred people on - and it still does so today. The fact that the region today produces world-renowned wines and spirits and the best apricots anywhere, is not entirely unrelated to the paintings which artists such as Robert Russ, Emil Jakob Schindler and Anton Hlavàček had been inspired to create in the Wachau Valley.

    Also of interest

    • Lower Austria

      Lower Austria charms with vineyards nestled along the Danube valley, paired with great music festivals in castles perched it the countryside - it's a perfect getaway for music lovers and oenophiles.

      Read more
          wine autumn in Wachau region
      media_content.tooltip.skipped
    • Wine in Lower Austria

      The beauty and lifestyle here seem inconceivable in this day and age - areas this pure and authentic tend to disappear. And locals here have chosen to embrace their heritage gastronomically, viticulturally and agriculturally.

      Read more
      media_content.tooltip.skipped
    media_content.tooltip.skipped