Zurich : Museum Rietberg Home > Tourist Guide > Table of contents > Zurich > The city > West bank > Museum Rietberg
The impressive Museum Rietberg (www.rietberg.ch)
comprises two villas set in a lush park southwest of the centre, which together
house a spectacular collection of non-European art. Signs from the Rietberg
stop on tram #7 direct you up into the park; a right-hand fork takes you to
the Villa Wesendonck, a left-hand fork to the Park-Villa Rieter. The main collection
is housed in the grandiose Villa Wesendonck (Tues–Sun 10am–5pm; Fr.6
for both buildings, plus about Fr.6 for any special exhibits), where the composer
Richard Wagner lived for a time in 1857. Once inside, head left for a chronological
tour, through rooms of Indian and Chinese Buddhist art and sculpture from between
the third and sixteenth centuries – look out for the blissfully serene lovers’
faces, in glorious contrast to the mournfulness on display in the Landesmuseum’s
European art of roughly the same period. A four-armed dancing Shiva in bronze,
surrounded by a ring of fire, is particularly stunning. Upstairs are some intricate
Tibetan bronzes, Chinese ceramics, and a host of American, African and Australasian
pieces. The smaller Park-Villa Rieter (Tues–Sat 1–5pm, Sun 10am–5pm)
houses on two floors changing selections from the museum’s enormous collection
of exquisite Asian painting: Indian art on ground level, Chinese and Japanese
art upstairs. |