At the beginning of the week, the “Year of the Renaissance” was declared with the opening of the Exhibition “Holbein.Burgkmair.Dürer.Renaissance in the North” at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Many art lovers as well as numerous guests and guests of honor from art, culture, business and politics – including former Federal President Heinz Fischer with his wife Margit and State Governor Johanna Mikkel-Leitner – took part in the event in the Dome Hall of the Art Museum. museum.

“It is an evening that symbolizes the fact that art and culture move and communicate across national borders,” Mikkel-Leitner said in her opening remarks about the Year of the Renaissance. Three “beacons of art and culture” in different federal states display this era in all its aspects throughout the year: the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, which focuses on the works of Hans Holbein, Hans Burgkmair and Albrecht Dürer, and the Ambras Castle in Innsbruck integrates the year of the Renaissance into its history. The permanent exhibition and castle invite you Renaissance Schlaburg in Lower Austria, which this year celebrates the 50th anniversary of its exhibition, is set to take a journey back in time to this era with “The Renaissance Then, Here and Now.”

The collaboration between these three galleries has three different axes, but a common goal: it should make art and culture accessible to everyone, create exchange and bring people together. For Mikkel-Leitner, this collaboration is groundbreaking because it shows that “more can be achieved when we work together.”

German Ambassador Vito Cecere said in his speech during the opening of the exhibition: “Art connects people and countries, today and 500 years ago.” He said: “In the Renaissance era, there were about 400 million people on the face of the earth, but today this number has become about 20 times.” This threatens to deplete the planet's resources, and today – and this is the synergy of the Renaissance – we are at a turning point characterized by wars and crises. “A turning point about resilience, sustainability and renewal, in order to leave our world loved for future generations.” This exhibition in particular links the past and the present, “and last but not least, it also provides comfort and tranquility” encouraging that change and new beginnings, just as before 500 years ago, it can also be humanized to design today. “Last but not least, this exhibition, which “began in Frankfurt am Main and expanded in Vienna,” is “another wonderful example of the wealth of the world.” Cooperation between Germany and Austria, the ambassador said.

The ceremonial opening was musically accompanied by the Arcicapella band.