Be they Baroque vedutas, magnificent Renaissance buildings, or architectural ensembles like Vienna’s Ringstrasse: since time immemorial, it has been architectural drawings that artists have used both to document the urban and rural past and to envision the future.

The presentation Masterpieces of Architecture provides new insights into this fascinating genre: a selection of around 120 highlights from the Albertina’s important collection of architecture-related works covers a period running from the Late Gothic and the Renaissance to the Baroque and Classicism, to Historicism and Art Nouveau, and continuing all the way to the architecture of the interwar period.

World-famous drawings by Albrecht Dürer, Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Theophil Hansen, Adolf Loos, and many others reveal the essence and unique qualities of architectural sketches while also showing painters’ compositional takes on and naturalistic perceptions of buildings, architectural ensembles, and cities.