In December 2012, CODART member Marian Bisanz-Prakken (*1947) formally retired from the Albertina Museum, where she worked for 36 years.

After completing her studies at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, she moved to Vienna, where she married the art historian Hans Bisanz. She assisted Alice Strobl (1919–2011), vice-director of the Albertina, in the preparation of the catalogue raisonné of the drawings of Gustav Klimt, and was appointed curator at the Albertina in 1976.

Her curatorial purview and scholarly research extended to two main fields. From the beginning she concentrated on the art of the Vienna Secession and especially that of Gustav Klimt, with a special emphasis on the influence of Dutch and Belgian Symbolism (Jan Toorop, Fernand Khnopff and George Minne) upon this pivotal Austrian artist. In the early 1990’s she intensified her focus on the Albertina’s comprehensive collection of Netherlandish drawings. During the last several decades she has curated various important exhibitions on Klimt, “Vienna 1900” and Rembrandt and his age.

Marian will not leave the Albertina altogether, for she will continue to be active there in the preparation of the supplementary volume of the catalogue raisonné of Klimt’s drawings. In this way she will ensure the Albertina’s ongoing preeminance as a center for scholarship and documentation of the art of Gustav Klimt.