‘Wien oder Salzburg?’: late Sedlmayr as a symptom and cure

Abstract

The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918 accelerated the ‘atomization’ of the Vienna School of Art History, which had started with the discussion ‘Orient oder Rom’. This process eventually resulted in the interdisciplinary of ‘The New Vienna School of Art History’, where Sedlmayr was one of the central figures. His scheme of four-level interpretation of works of art, in which the eschatological level is also considered, can be applied to his own work. This allows for the better understanding of both his method and the logic of his writings as whole entities. Considering the importance of ‘ruins’ for Sedlmayr, the author pays special attention to his text on preservation of monuments, ‘Die demolierte Schönheit…’ (1965), created in Salzburg, a cultural-historical parallel to Vienna, where Sedlmayr spent the last twenty years of his life.