Schiller Park
It’s All About the Monuments
Located in Schillerplatz in Vienna's first district, discover the attractive and historic Schillerpark, with all of its beautiful and meaningful monuments. The Schiller Park is smaller than many other green areas of the inner city; however, it is one of the most amazing parks in Vienna.
In the center of the park you'll find the Schiller monument, dedicated to Friedrich Schiller, one of the first artists to whom a representative monument was dedicated on a public square in Vienna. Until then, such monuments were usually only for rulers or generals. In 1891, two other monuments dedicated to poets were built in the corners of the Schillerpark. One is in honor of Anastasius Grün and the other is dedicated to Nicholas Lenau. They are stone busts on stelae with figures of genii at their feet.
There is a smaller monument on the edge of the park, a bronze bust for the poet Josef Weinheber, created in 1940 by Josef Bock. It was built in 1975 on a granite base; however, in 2010, Stephan Schmidt-Wulffen of the Academy of Fine Arts demanded that the Vienna City Council remove the monument because of Weinheber's positive attitude toward National Socialism.
The most recent monument added to the Schiller Park was unveiled in 2000. It was created on behalf of Armenia and depicts the Austrian writer Franz Werfel, who wrote a compelling novel commemorating the struggle of the Armenian people against their Ottoman oppressors. The sculpture is engraved with the inscription: In gratitude. The Armenian people.
