This seems to be the only painted representation of the arrival of Sissi, the future Austrian Empress in Vienna, two days before her marriage in 1854 with Emperor Franz Joseph I. Our anonymous painter has copied the composition of an engraving by Vincent Katzler, which sits today in the collection of the Palace of Schönbrunn in Vienna.

 

 

Sissi, the famous future Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary was born in December 1837 in Munich as Duchess Elisabeth Amalie Eugenie of Bavaria. She belonged to the House of Wittelsbach.

 

At the age of 16 she married her first cousin, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria, in Vienna in April 1854. They had met eight months earlier that previous summer when a plausible future marriage was to be arranged between the emperor and Sissi’s elder sister Néné. But thing turned out differently as the emperor immediately fell in love with Sissi.

 

Sissi left her parent’s house in Munich April 20th and travelled in a six-horse carriage to Straubing, where she boarded a steam ship, “Stadt Regensburg” that would take her along the Danube to Linz in Austria, where her future husband waited for her. The emperor left already very early the next morning for Nussdorf, the Danube-port of Vienna, to arrange for her reception there. Sissi left Linz the 22nd aboard a new luxurious, 140 horsepower passenger ship the “Franz Joseph I”. Her journey would be marked by countless official ceremonies, festive activities and large cheering crowds.

 

 

Our painting shows the immense triumphal arch (“Triumphhalle”) in Nussdorf, the port of Vienna, with the Emperor and his future wife greeting the Vienese crowds. The blue-white flags refer to Bavaria, the red-white ones to Austria.

 

Left of the couple stand Sissi’s two Bavarian ladies in waiting. On the quay waits Sissi’s future mother-in-law, Archduchess Sophie.

 

The composition copies an engraving, originally designed as a newspaper illustration, of the festive arrival by Vincent Katzler (1823 – 1882) from the collection of the palace of Schönbrunn in Vienna. To my knowledge this is the only painted representation of this subject.

 

 

Because this is your chance to purchase a unique representation of an important romantic-historical moment.