Collegiate Church

When the Austrian master builder Johann Fischer von Erlach created the building as a university church on behalf of the Archbishop of Salzburg Johann Ernestus von Thun from 1696 to 1707, one of the most important Baroque churches in Central Europe was built. The strict forms of the nave, the unadorned white of the room shell allow absolute concentration on the architecture. Only behind the two mighty pillars of the sanctuary, as it were in "Paradise", does the classical severity dissolve into a playful Baroque. Created by the architect and the client as a place of wisdom, the Kollegienkirche invites to a dialogue between the various arts and the divine, whose spark pervades the world. It is Salzburg's art church, a new place for spirituality, where the exchange with contemporary art and artists is program.