Berta Zuckerkandl

Bertha Zuckerkandl (Vilma Lwoff-Parlaghy, 1886)

Berta Zuckerkandl-Szeps, born Bertha Szeps (13 April 1864, Vienna – 16 October 1945, Paris) was an Austrian writer, journalist, and art critic.

Bertha Szeps was the daughter of Galician Jewish liberal newspaper publisher Moritz Szeps and was raised in Vienna. She was married to the Hungarian anatomist Emil Zuckerkandl.

Plaque commemorating Zuckerkandl's salon, Palais Lieben-Auspitz, Vienna

From end of the 19th century until 1938, she led an important literary salon in Vienna, originally from a villa in Döbling, later in the Oppolzergasse near the Burgtheater. Many famous Viennese artists and personalities including Auguste Rodin, Gustav Klimt, Gustav Mahler, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Max Reinhardt, Arthur Schnitzler Stefan Zweig, Egon Friedell and others frequented the salon. Protégés of the salon include Anton Kolig and Sebastian Isepp of the Nötsch Circle. Her sister Sophie (1862–1937) was married to Paul Clemenceau, the brother of the French President Georges Clemenceau, and, therefore, she also had good ties to Parisian artistic circles. She translated a number of plays from French to German and was a cofounder of the Salzburg Music Festival.

In 1938, she emigrated to Paris and later to Algiers. She returned in 1945 to Paris and died there the same year. She is buried at the Père Lachaise Cemetery.

Works

• Die Pflege der Kunst in Österreich 1848–1898.
• Dekorative Kunst und Kunstgewerbe. Wien, 1900
• Zeitkunst Wien 1901–1907. Hugo Heller, Wien, 1908
• Ich erlebte 50 Jahre Weltgeschichte. Bermann-Fischer Verlag, Stockholm, 1939
• Clemenceau tel que je l'ai connu. Algier, 1944
• Österreich intim. Erinnerungen 1892–1942. Propyläen, Frankfurt/Main, 1970 (paperback edition: Ullstein, Frankfurt am Main, 1988; ISBN 3-548-20985-8)

Further reading

• Lucian O. Meysels: In meinem Salon ist Österreich. Berta Zuckerkandl und ihre Zeit. 3. A. Herold, Wien 1985 ISBN 3-7008-0263-3

See also

• Salon of Berta Zuckerkandl