Prince Johann Adam Andreas I von Liechtenstein
1657–1712
Anton Peter van Roy (1683—1738), Portrait of Prince Johann Adam Andreas I von Liechtenstein (1657–1712), c. 1706
Predecessor
Prince Karl Eusebius I von Liechtenstein
Successor
Prince Anton Florian I von LiechtensteinPrince Johann Adam Andreas I von Liechtenstein reorganized the administration and consolidated the finances of the Princely House. Having created a solid economic basis, he commissioned the building and furnishing of two magnificent palaces in Vienna: the City Palace on Bankgasse and the Garden Palace in the extra-mural suburb of Rossau. In 1699 he acquired the imperial demesne of Schellenberg and in 1712 the imperial county of Vaduz, thus laying the foundations for the future Imperial Principality of Liechtenstein.
The only surviving son of Prince Karl Eusebius I (1611–1684) and his wife Johanna Beatrix, Johann Adam Andreas I was born at Brünn (Brno) on 30 November 1657. He married Countess Erdmunda von Dietrichstein (1652–1737). The couple had twelve children but none of their sons survived into adulthood. Johann Adam Andreas I died at his Garden Palace in Vienna on 16 June 1712.
Prince Johann Adam Andreas I reorganized the administration of the princely estates, putting the family’s finances on a new, sound footing. This reorganization was accompanied by drastic changes in staffing and economic strategy, rigorous measures that were nonetheless borne out by the resulting success. The encumbrances from the reign of Prince Karl Eusebius I were cleared in a short space of time and such significant profits realized that the prince was known as ‘the Rich’ and the ‘Austrian Croesus’.
Prince Johann Adam Andreas I reorganized the administration of the princely estates, putting the family’s finances on a new, sound footing.
The prince’s financial talents soon came to the ears of Emperor Leopold I: among other posts he was appointed first president of the Banco del Giro, founded after the bankruptcy of the Oppenheimer bank in 1703. The Banco del Giro was a new kind of state bank intended primarily to provide long-term financing for the emperor’s military campaigns. However, attempts to reduce the presidium’s sphere of influence led to the prince resigning from this office by 1705.
With the acquisition of the demesnes of Schellenberg and Vaduz in 1699 and 1712 the princely dynasty was approaching the goal it had pursued for almost a hundred years: gaining a seat and vote in the Imperial Diet.
THE PRINCE AS ARCHITECTURAL PATRON
Prince Johann Adam Andreas I was one of the most important patrons of his time, commissioning a number of major architectural projects. His name is inextricably linked with the rise of the Austrian Baroque. The victory over the Ottoman Empire in 1683 had created space for new political and economic developments, circumstances that the prince knew better than most how to exploit. At the periphery, on the family estates in Moravia, things must have initially seemed more secure than in the imperial capital that had just been fiercely fought over. At Eisgrub (Lednice) Johann Adam Andreas I took a first decisive step with the erection of the monumental stables, which were larger than the residential building itself as it was at the time.
Prince Johann Adam Andreas I was one of the most important patrons of his time, commissioning a number of major architectural projects.
In Vienna he commissioned a Garden Palace in the extra-mural suburb of Rossau as the centre of an entire planned settlement. In the city itself he had the City Palace completed. In their formal coherence both buildings were to have an exemplary effect on palatial architecture in Vienna.
ITALIAN ART AS MODEL
Johann Adam Andreas I considered Italian painters, architects, sculptors and fresco artists indispensable to the realization of his architectural projects. His collecting and commissioning of works of art were closely bound up with this. Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach (1656–1723), Domenico Egidio Rossi (1659–1715) and Domenico Martinelli (1650–1719) as well as Lucas von Hildebrandt (1668–1745) worked for him as architects. The prince obtained the services of Marcantonio Franceschini (1648–1729) and Antonio Bellucci (1654–1726) to create the major cycles of oil paintings for the decoration of the two palaces in Vienna.
Johann Adam Andreas I considered Italian painters, architects, sculptors and fresco artists indispensable to the realization of his architectural projects.
An important role in this was played by his cousin Anton Florian I von Liechtenstein (1656–1721), who during his posting as imperial ambassador to the papal court in Rome was able to procure works of art to send to Vienna and induce artists such as Andrea Pozzo (1642–1709) to work for the prince. Pozzo spent the years 1704 to 1708 painting the ceiling fresco in the Hercules Hall of the Garden Palace with its pantheon of Olympian gods and the canonical Labours of Hercules.
COMMISSIONS FOR SCULPTURES
A major role was played by Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi (1656–1740), who had received regular commissions from the prince since 1694
Although the prince made use of the Italian sculptor Giovanni Giuliani (1664–1744) from the beginning, his confidence in the latter’s creative potential evidently had its limits. He made valuable bronzes from his collection available to the artist and ordered ‘modelli’ from Giuseppe Maria Mazza (1653–1741), which Giuliani was then obliged to use as models for the garden sculptures at the palace in the Rossau and for the decoration of the stairway in the City Palace.
A major role was played by Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi (1656–1740), who on the recommendation of Marchese Clemente Vitelli, the Florentine envoy at the papal court, had received regular commissions from the prince since 1694. He made copies of antique works of art for Johann Adam Andreas I, including the “Medici Venus” and the “Dancing Faun”, and later on a series of busts of the Roman emperors. Subsequently the prince also purchased copies of Renaissance and Baroque masters such as Michelangelo (1475–1564) and Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598–1680), and ultimately works by Soldani-Benzi himself, in the form of a series of bronze reliefs.
FLEMISH PAINTING AS A FOCUS OF THE PRINCE’S ACQUISITIONS
Making adept use of his contacts in the international fine art trade, Johann Adam Andreas I assembled one of the most important collections of Flemish painting in a very short space of time. His interests focused on the works of Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640) and Anthony van Dyck (1599–1641). The great “Decius Mus” cycle, which the prince had been attempting to acquire since 1692 and for which he ran into considerable debt, was purchased as a series by van Dyck. We have known for a long time, a circumstance confirmed by modern-day research, that the ‘concetto’ for this cycle originated with Rubens, with Jacques Jordaens (1593–1678) and the very young van Dyck assisting the master in the execution of the paintings in Rubens’s studio.
Making adept use of his contacts in the international fine art trade, Johann Adam Andreas I assembled one of the most important collections of Flemish painting in a very short space of time.
Johann Adam Andreas I's acquisitions include major works by Rubens, such as the dual portrait of his two sons Albert and Nicholas, the portrait of his daughter Clara Serena and the painting of Venus gazing out at us from her looking-glass. These were joined by early portraits and works with mythological and religious subjects, making the holdings of Rubens in the Princely Collections among the most important in the world. The same is true of the holdings of van Dyck, which span the artist’s oeuvre from early portraits and religious works such as “St Jerome” to portraits such as that of Maria de Tassis. The most important parts of the prince’s collection were displayed on the second piano nobile of the City Palace in Vienna from 1705.
