A visionary museum at the base of the Alps | The Liaunig

Riccardo Bianchini, Inexhibit



Who is driving along the narrow road that, bordering the Drava river, runs on the southern edge of Carinthia toward the Slovenian border would probably be surprised by a dazzling vision: a huge cantilevered concrete box emerging from a grassy hillock, apparently floating free over the thoroughfare.

Or, much more probably, you reach it not by chance, deviating from the main road that connects Klagenfurt and Graz to pay a visit at one of the most interesting museums in Austria: the Liaunig.

The museum was created to display the collections of the industrialist Herbert W. Liaunig, composed of over 3,000 modern and contemporary artworks and of a noteworthy selection of African gold objects. An emerging Austrian architectural practice, querkraft, was therefore selected to design the new home of the museum, opened in 2008.

The building architecture is quite peculiar: in order to reduce construction cost and energy consumption, the museum is largely built underground.

From the main entrance, visitors cross a large hall, where the museum deposits are located and visible through a large glass enclosure, reaching a spectacular main exhibition gallery. This has the shape of a 160 metres-long, 13 metres wide, concrete tube forming a single 2,000 square metres hall where paintings and sculptures are exposed. Several ceiling windows provide the gallery of natural light on all its length. Two large terraced openings at both ends of the tube offer a stunning view on the surrounding landscape, one overlooking the street and the hills behind and the other facing the Drava river valley.

Separate rooms for graphics works as well as dedicated to the African gold collection further complete the building program, both spaces are completely underground.

Images courtesy of Museum Liaunig

The 2015 expansion

After being closed for one year for expansion works, the Liaunig museum reopened in Spring 2015 with brand new exhibition galleries. The expansion project, again designed by querkraft architects, complete the space program of the museum.

above: axonometric cut-off of the museum complex

above: the triangular-shaped hall for special exhibitions.

A triangular-shaped hall for special exhibitions at the ground floor, with an adjoining atrium where paintings by Sean Scully are on view until October 2015, two underground galleries where the permanent collections of glass works and miniatures are showcased, and a fascinating circular storage space for sculptures, accessible to the visitors, have been added to the the original building.

Furthermore, the services to the public have been completed with a museum store, accessible from the entrance foyer. The Liaunig museum is now recognized as a listed building and has been awarded the “Austrian Museum Prize”.

above: the new storage space.

All images courtesy of The Liaunig Museum