Strahov Art Gallery

Strahov Art Gallery

The Strahov Art Gallery, founded in 1835, today contains over two thousand paintings. The most valuable part is now installed in the publicly accessible corridors of the convent building's upper floor, and we invite you to tour it. Nearly two hundred displayed paintings present works from the 14th to the 20th century.

Before visiting the Strahov Art Gallery, purchase tickets either at the ticket office in St. Roch's Church at the main gate of the monastery or online. A tour of the Gallery is only possible as part of the joint tour, which includes the library and other abbey premises. Before entering the circuit, luggage must be placed in a locker at the box office in the Church of St. Roch near the main monastery gate. Find ticket prices here.

Tickets purchase

Notice: From July 23 to August 3, the General Chapter of the Order will take place at the Strahov Abbey. During this time, some areas of the Abbey will not be accessible to visitors, and the joint tour, including the gallery, will also not be open.

The Joint Tour of the monastery including Library, Art Gallery and Abbey premises can be purchased at this link:

purchase an eTicket

Or you can purchase tickets on-site at the box office, located in the Church of St. Roch near the main monastery gate.
where is the ticket office

Significant Works

The Enlightenment brought about the dissolution of many monasteries, including their contents, but for the Strahov Premonstratensians, it also served as a stimulus for the development of their collecting activities. Even under Abbot F.M. Daller (1764–1777), following the suppression of the Jesuit Order, the Apostolic Cycle created by Ignaz Raab in 1751 for the Clementinum and the large canvas Christ Ministered by Angels (1684) by Johann Georg Heinsch from the professional house in Malá Strana were acquired.

A decisive moment for the future direction of the painting collection was in 1793 when two panel paintings were purchased: Madonna della Sedia, mistakenly thought to be an original by Raphael of Urbino (the painting is currently missing), and The Feast of the Rosary by Albrecht Dürer, acquired by Abbot V. Mayer from the court council and chief postal inspector Ignatz Georg Fillbaum. At that time, Bohumír Jan Dlabač, a revivalist and collector of engravings, was serving as the librarian.

Collection Breakdown

• Painting and Sculpture 1300–1570: Strahov Madonna from around 1340, Master of the Vyšší Brod Madonna, Master of the Litoměřice Altarpiece, Master of the Čáslav Panel, Master IW, and others...
• Rudolfine Painting: Bartholomeus Spranger, Hans von Aachen, Joseph Heintz the Elder, Dirk de Quade van Ravesteyn, etc.
• Flemish Painting: Jacob Mostaert, Frans Francken II, Gillis van Valckenborch, Anthony van Dyck, Alexander Adriaenssen, etc.
• Italian Painting: Luca Cambiaso, Sebastiano Ricci, Pompeo Batoni, etc.
• Central European Painting 17th–19th Century: Johann Karl Loth, Johann Karl Liška, Michael Václav Halbax, Petr Brandl, Václav Vavřinec Reiner, Franz Michael Purgau, Johann Georg Beitler, Karl Joseph Hirschely, Anton Kern, Norbert Grund, Franz Karl Palko, Franz Anton Maulbertsch, Franz Xaver Procházka, etc.

History of the Art Collection

The oldest layer of artistic production created specifically for Strahov was largely lost due to the turbulent history of the monastery in the 15th and 16th centuries. The number of paintings increased during the first third of the 17th century, mainly due to commissions placed with the painter Johann Georg Hering. At that time, numerous hanging paintings were created, many of which have survived to this day. In the second half of the 17th century, artists such as Antonín Stevens of Steinfels, Michael Willmann, and Johann Christoph Liška painted for the Strahov canonry. In the early 18th century, the canonry's non-Prague properties were adorned by the works of Michael Václav Halbax and Petr Brandl.

Especially in Strahov, Václav Nosek/Nosecký and his son, conventual and painter Siard Václav Nosecký, also made significant contributions. After Strahov was damaged by bombardment in 1742, leading sculptors and painters of the time, such as Jiří Vilém Josef Neunhertz, František Xaver Karl Palko, and Franz Lichtenreiter, worked on the monastery's restoration. In 1794, Franz Anton Maulbertsch worked on the fresco of the new library hall. At the beginning of the 19th century, the first rector of the Prague Academy of Fine Arts, Josef Bergler, designed a new sarcophagus for the remains of St. Norbert, and the painting decoration of the abbot's dining room was supplemented by Josef Březiny.

Abbot Jerome II. Joseph Zeidler (abbot 1834–1870) decided to create a picture gallery in the billiard hall of the convent one year after his election. About four hundred paintings were hung on the walls and panels. His son Josef K. Burde helped with the selection and installation of the paintings, an inspector of the Picture Gallery of the Society of Patriotic Friends of Art (predecessor of today's National Gallery in Prague). At the same time, a so-called Main Catalogue of the gallery was created, recording paintings placed in the gallery hall since 1840, with a second volume of the catalog founded. Simultaneously, a large number of other paintings were gathered in the monastery, mainly gifts from the property of order members and legacies of monks (1833 P. Gilbert Kerner, 1835 P. Siard Hladký, 1860 P. Emerich Petřík), other works were acquired directly from painters (Josef Bergler, Dominik Kottula, Jan Gruss), collectors (gubernatorial council Franz Janko), and picture dealers (Fanny Procházková), as it was widely known that paintings were being collected for the creation of the gallery. A part of them was installed in the so-called balcony room facing the city, around 150 pieces were distributed in the representative and private rooms of the abbot in the prelature building.

The painting collection was also enriched by donations from the nobility, who used the basilica as a place of last rest in their family crypts; other works of art were brought back by the heads of the monastery from their travels, or they were gifted by other prelates. Acquisitions were connected with the need to decorate representative spaces, but also rural residences, parishes, and, last but not least, administrative offices. Most acquisitions of the Strahov Picture Gallery took place by the end of the 1840s, and quality generally replaced quantity. Among the larger additions after the mid-century was the estate of Premonstratensian Hugo V. Seykor (1793–1856), which contained some quality paintings by Baroque painters including Brandl's self-portrait. However, precise provenance details are missing for most of the paintings.

At the end of the 19th century, acquisition activity of the Gallery practically ceased, and due to its location in the cloister, it became a place of only occasional visits. At the beginning of the 20th century, there were considerations to build a separate building for the art collections, but this did not occur, and the exhibition was only reinstalled in 1906–1907 by the director of the Rudolfinum, Pavel Bergner.

In 1934, the Rosary Festival along with the mineralogical collection was sold to the Czechoslovak state and entrusted to the Picture Gallery of the Society of Patriotic Friends of Art, whose first chairman after the creation of independent Czechoslovakia was elected Strahov abbot Method Zavoral. Thanks to his efforts, Strahov's summer refectory, above which the Picture Gallery was located, became a place where the Society's paintings, which needed to be stored after the evacuation of the Rudolfinum, were deposited between 1920 and 1928.

Paintings also returned shortly after the creation of the Protectorate when part of the collections of the Czech-Moravian Land Gallery (today's National Gallery in Prague) was hidden here for security reasons. In the 1930s, a new catalog of the Picture Gallery was produced, and attributions were specified, with oversight of the art collections carried out by the monk, historian, and archivist Cyril J. Měcháček (1884—1935).

On the night of April 14, 1950, units of the People's Militia and members of the State Security burst into the monastery as part of "Action K." After the internment of the monks, the paintings were sorted during the subsequent "Action K" and transported to the National Gallery, the collecting depots of the National Cultural Commission, and part of the paintings was handed over to Charity for "retirement." The fading awareness of the Strahov Picture Gallery was partially revived by organizing two exhibitions in 1973 and 1974 in the former church of St. Roch at Strahov. Restitution after 1990 once again gave the opportunity to gather part of the art collections back at Strahov. However, hundreds of paintings did not return. Some were not located, and a larger number of them were sold by heritage authorities in the 1960s.

Catalog of the Art Collection

In cooperation with significant Czech and international galleries and institutions, the collection is being newly scientifically processed and digitized. Paintings are loaned out for numerous exhibitions, and the collection is gradually introduced through short-term exhibitions.

The catalog of the art collection (electronic form, inventory cards) and conservation reports on the paintings are accessible by arrangement with the curator of the art collections in accordance with the research regulations of the Strahov Picture Gallery. The painting collection is registered in the CES of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.

Treasury

The exhibition comprises a collection of works of art, documenting the variety of preserved liturgical objects, created directly on the order of the order or acquired by the canonry through purchase or donation. Alongside excellent examples of Czech goldsmith work, you will find a number of unique objects of broader European provenance, including examples of producers of liturgical textiles. The aim of the exhibition is not only to present liturgical art products kept for centuries in the property of the Strahov canonry but also to illustrate their symbolic meaning and liturgical function. The presentation demonstrates two of the five basic spiritual directions of the Premonstratensian order – the liturgical life and the Eucharistic life.

The exhibition has been accessible since 2017 and was prepared in collaboration with the Olomouc Art Museum with financial support from the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic from the program Support for exhibition and exhibition projects.

Curators of the exhibition: Libor Šturc, Helena Zápalková.