Gustav Klimt’s ’After the Rain’ debuts in new exhibition
A new exhibition is now on view at the National Museum of History. This special showcase is a collaboration between Vienna’s Belvedere Museum and the National Museum of History, featuring more than 60 flower-themed works spanning from the late 18th century to the early 20th century. Among the highlights is Gustav Klimt’s original masterpiece "After the Rain," presented for the very first time in Taiwan. FTV reporter Stephany Yang has the details.
One of the centerpiece works is Gustav Klimt’s "After the Rain." This Taipei exhibition marks the first occasion that original pieces from the Belvedere’s collection are being displayed in Taiwan.
Besides After the Rain, the exhibition also features a room with an immersive multimedia installation. This interactive presentation highlights Klimt’s artistic journey, showcasing a selection of his works while illustrating his creative process. Visitors can step into a vivid, multisensory environment that brings Klimt’s techniques and inspirations to life, offering deeper insight into how his masterpieces were conceived and produced.
Lin Juei-tang
National Museum of History research assistant
We think this is a very rare opportunity to show this work, and we want to introduce all aspects of his art so besides displaying his "After the Rain," we also designed a multi-media experience so that the audience can enjoy and understand the process of Klimt’s creation and how he created art.
Other notable works include pieces by Johann Knapp, one of Austria’s most renowned flower painters at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. Over his career, Knapp produced thousands of watercolor studies of plants. On display here is his celebrated work "Homage to Jacquin."
Lin Juei-tang
National Museum of History research assistant
This is a work that substantially embodies the relationship between art and science at that time. In the early 18th century, you can see that the development of flower painting in Vienna is closely related to the nobility’s interest in developing biology and scientific exploration, so in this work, we see that actually, Jacquin is a biologist working in Vienna. In this work, we see that the artist Johann Knapp includes lots of flowers, mushrooms, and even exotic animals.
Another featured artist is Johann Baptist Drechsler, regarded as one of the most influential flower painters and educators in Austria during the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Lin Juei-tang
National Museum of History research assistant
We see the traditional pot and flowers are really arranged in kind of a natural background. We see the trees and sky. These are actually rarely seen in previous flower paintings. We think that this actually represents a very important tradition of flower painting that they are moving from indoors gradually to outdoors.
To commemorate the National Museum of History’s 70th anniversary, Vienna’s Belvedere Museum and the National Museum of History in Taipei collaborated to host an exhibition. The exhibition spans 200 years of European art history. Visitors can trace the evolution of styles from Baroque, Romanticism, and Impressionism to the beginnings of Modernism.
Lin Juei-tang
National Museum of History research assistant
Throughout the years, the National Museum of History has introduced to the audience in Taiwan the great works by Picasso, Van Gogh and Monet, we want to expand the vision of Taiwan’s audience by introducing these flower paintings from Vienna because we think that flower paintings and still life are something that Taiwan’s audience are maybe not so familiar with. Through this exhibition, we are trying to show the more than 200 years of history of this kind of genre that has developed in central Europe.
The exhibition will run at the National Museum of History until March 22.
For more Taiwan news, tune in:
Mon to Fri at 9:30 pm on Channel 152
Tue to Sat at 1 am on Channel 53
#BelvedereMuseum #VienneseFlowerPaintings #Paintings #Flower #GustavKlimt #Vienna #NationalMuseumofHistory #Orginal
2025-12-25
