Palais Lanckoroński

The noble Lanckoroński family, aristocrats originally from Poland, assembled a major art collection through the generations, including Italian Renaissance paintings as well as German, French, and Dutch pictures, antique sculptures, bronzes, glass miniatures and porcelain.

Frequent visitors to the palace were the artists Hans Makart, Viktor Oskar Tilgner, Arnold Böcklin, Kaspar von Zumbusch and Auguste Rodin.

After the end of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Count decided to return to Poland and began to move a large part of his collection to the family’s ancestral estate in Galicia.

Göring kept the pictures despite an order from Hitler to return them; nevertheless, the decree prevented the loss of the majority of Austria's works of art beyond its borders.

Financial costs for a renovation were deemed too high, so during the 1960s the palace was completely torn down, and a modern office block was built on the site for Hoffmann-La Roche.

After the partition of Poland in 1795, many of the objects in the Royal Castle that were sold off were bought by Polish noble families, including the Lanckoroński.

The art objects that remained after World War II were sold by the three heirs to the National Gallery, London as well as the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.

Paintings from the collection formerly housed in Vienna, today in the Royal Castle in Warsaw, include:[4] other pieces are by Ludolph Backhuysen and Philips Wouwerman.

:[5] Pieces in the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere in Vienna include:[6] The realist painter Rudolf von Alt met Count Lanckoronski in Nuremberg on August 29, 1881.