Innsbrucker Riesenrundgemälde

The Innsbruck Riesenrundgemälde is a giant circular panorama of the third battle at Bergisel on 13 August 1809. It stands in the Tirol Panorama building on the southern edge of Innsbruck, close to where the fighting took place. The circular canvas covers more than 1,000 square metres and shows 15,000 Bavarian, Saxon and French troops facing an equal number of Tyrolean sharpshooters. The work was commissioned from Michael Zeno Diemer in 1896 and prepared with help from Franz von Defregger. Franz Burger, W. Flaucher, Anton Niedermaier and A. Pätzold assisted in painting it. Though Andreas Hofer appears in the scene, he was not actually present at the battle. The panorama is one of only 28 such pre-war works still surviving worldwide. Visitors enter a raised platform in the centre and walk around the curved canvas. A false terrain of earth and rocks reinforces the illusion of depth. Above the platform a velum controls the light so that the roof and upper edge of the painting remain unseen. The whole effect is designed to make the scene feel three-dimensional.