LEOPOLD MUSEUM: TOKI SHIROTA FROM JAPAN IS 100,000TH VISITOR OF THE EXHIBITION "HIDDEN MODERNISM"
12.01.2026
SUCCESSFUL EXHIBITION STILL ON DISPLAY UNTIL 18TH JANUARY
On Thursday, 8th January, the Leopold Museum’s Director Hans-Peter Wipplinger welcomed the 100,000th visitor of the exhibition Hidden Modernism. The Fascination with the Occult Around 1900. Toki Shirota, a company employee from the Japanese capital Tokyo, is a first-time visitor to Vienna. Having traveled to the Austrian capital on the recommendation of her husband, her enthusiasm for art and culture led her to the Leopold Museum to see chief works by Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele, and to experience the current special exhibition Hidden Modernism. Delighted with her impressions, she is keen to return to the museum with her ten-year-old son on her next visit to Vienna. Hans-Peter Wipplinger congratulated Mrs. Shirota, and presented her with a bouquet of flowers as well as a catalogue on the exhibition Hidden Modernism. The commemorative photograph was taken in front of the 1898 Symbolist painting The Souls of the Acheron by Adolf Hirémy-Hirschl, one of the most iconic paintings featured in the exhibition.
Lecture by Bazon Brock on the Exhibition Hidden Modernism
On Friday, 16 January at 4 pm, the prominent German art theorist and artist Bazon Brock will give a talk on the exhibition Hidden Modernism, which is still on display until Sunday, 18th January. In his lecture, titled Occultism and Spirituality as Proof of Reason in Modern Arts, Sciences and Everyday Life (in German), he will look at the presentation from the perspective of philosophy and art history.
The event at the Leopold Museum’s auditorium may be attended free of charge with a valid museum ticket. No registration required.
Further information on the lecture by Bazon Brock
On the Exhibition
Hidden Modernism is the first extensive overview exhibition in Austria dedicated to the diverse occult-reformist milieu in Vienna around 1900. The presentation, curated by Matthias Dusini and Ivan Ristić, shines the spotlight on the subcultures that explored spiritualistic and theosophical doctrines, and unfolds the panorama of an era shaped by the search for alternatives. It highlights many parallels to the present day which is equally characterized by the quest for a better future and hidden (“occult”) truths.
The exhibition on this “other” Modernism, covering the period of the 1860s into the 1930s, unites around 180 works by more than 70 artists, among them Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach, Richard Gerstl, Gusto Gräser, Adolf Hirémy-Hirschl, Ferdinand Hodler, Gertrude Honzatko-Mediz, Hugo Höppener (Fidus), Johannes Itten, Wassily Kandinsky, Franziska Kantor, Friedrich August von Kaulbach, Albert von Keller, Fernand Khnopff, Erika Giovanna Klien, Gustav Klimt, Max Klinger, Oskar Kokoschka, Alfred Kubin, František Kupka, Erwin Lang, Erich Mallina, Gabriel von Max, Karl Mediz, Koloman Moser, Edvard Munch, Joseph Maria Olbrich, Max Oppenheimer, Adolf Ost, Gertraud Reinberger-Brausewetter, Egon Schiele, Arnold Schönberg, August Strindberg, Anton Josef Trčka, My (Marianne) Ullmann, Eduard Veith, Otto Wagner, and many others.
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