After my visit of the Panorama Mesdag in The Hague / Den Haag, Netherlands, I just had to visit the panorama painting in Salzburg, when I visited the Austrian city in summer 2020. The official name is Panorama Museum and it is located in the heart of the city. Here is my review.

 

 

Salzburg Panorama Museum – Location & Admission

You can surely say that the Salzburg Panorama Museum is located at a premium destination. It is right opposite the Dom zu Salzburg / Salzburg Cathedral at the Residenzplatz. The famous Mozartplatz (Mozart Square) with a statue of the famous composer is just around the corner.  The lovely pedestrian zone which shops and restaurants as well as a couple of key attractions are in short walking distance. There is a parking garage nearby, but I would generally recommend (if not avoidable) to use public transport to access the city. The same building hosts the Salzburg Museum, the Christmas Museum is just a few steps away.

Adult admission to the Panorama Museum is 4.50 Euro. The museum is open daily, 9:00 to 17:00 hrs.

 

Salzburg Panorama Museum – The Exhibitions

In the world of arts, the Salzburg Panorama is typically referred to as Sattler-Panorama. this is due to its painter, Johann Michael Sattler. The Austrian painter lived from 1786 to 1847 and painted the panorama from 1825 to 1829. The painting has a height of 4.86 meters and a width of 25.53 meters. This means that the piece of arts has a total size of 124 square meters and a diameter of some eight meters. The building is a former post office, as far as I understood.

Before you enter the panoramic cylinder, you see other works of Sattler with different so-called cosmoramic paintings, which also have a perspective and panoramic touch. By that technique, the paintings feel very real and come with a strong depth. Like in the panorama itself, I was impressed of the way Sattler introduced reflections on water, shadows and similar optic effects to his works.

 

Salzburg Panorama Museum – The Panorama

You enter the panorama itself from stairs in the bottom, before you finally stand in the middle of the platform. Compared to the Mesdag painting in the Netherlands, I was especially fond of the higher level of detail and realism. The painting illustrates the view of Salzburg and surroundings from Festung Hohensalzburg / Hohensalzburg Fortress. The size of the panorama were so called Travel Panoramas and could be shown in exhibitions all over the world – the Sattler Panorama is the only preserved one of that kind and era and is thus an incredible cultural heritage. It visited cities like Copenhagen, Cologne, Amsterdam, Brussels, Nuremberg, Hamburg or Berlin. You can overall see it as an early form of tourism marketing.

 

Salzburg Panorama Museum – Services

There is a gift shop and information at the entrance to the museum. The staff was really friendly, I had a nice chat with the person at the reception desk.

 

Salzburg Panorama Museum – My View

I am really not an arts fan, but I could stand in the middle of a panorama cylinder for hours and look for all the details and stories. Compared to the Mesdag Panorama, there is the smaller size – but the level of detail and the perspective is so much better, you just feel more realism. Thus, visiting the Panorama Museum in Salzburg was an absolutely remarkable part of my visit to Mozart’s hometown.

 

Flyctory in Salzburg & Berchtesgadener Land

All my postings related to the German – Austrian region of Salzburg & Berchtesgadener Land:

 

Graphic Arts on Flyctory.com

Under the Graphic Arts tag, I sum up all kinds of paintings, graphics and prints: