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Title : I owe a lot to a man named Brueghel
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I owe a lot to a man named Brueghel

[By Róisín Curé in Vienna] When I heard that there was a huge Brueghel exhibition in Vienna, the largest collection for 450 years, I resolved to go. Never mind that I have three kids who need me around, no family in the vicinity who could look after them, an over-spent credit card and a deadline for a book - I would leave no stone unturned to get to it.

You see, I had one piece of art on my wall as a child: a poster of Brueghel the Elder's Peasant Wedding. It was all the art I knew at seven years old and for many years, and since my very first oil painting when I was about 10, and in everything I drew in any medium after that, the stamp of Brueghel could be seen under varying numbers of layers of, well, me.

I had had a big birthday the previous February and between losing family members to illness, worrying about others with various serious illnesses, sick relatives and more worry, it just wasn't a festive-feeling year. But all of those situations had come to a conclusion, some happy, some less so, and it seemed there would be a chance to go after all - IF tickets could be found.
They were not yet sold out online when my husband and I went to buy some (despite having no idea how we'd get to Vienna) - but the system was buggy and wouldn't let us purchase. We phoned the gallery in Vienna.
"I'm sorry, Madam, but it appears there is an issue with the server. No one in Britain or Ireland can buy tickets. You may email us, and we will arrange for you to purchase them over the phone."
That was a Friday. They did not answer our email (please allow two working days etc.) and by the time Monday came around, all the tickets were gone.

It was time to call in the big guns.

My husband Marcel has family in Vienna. His mother is Viennese. I had never met his cousins. It was the perfect opportunity to meet them for the first time - would they be able to call in to the gallery and buy tickets for us? There were some available to buy in person.
Well...it turned out that one of the cousins' wives actually worked in the very gallery where the exhibition was being held, on the actual Brueghel exhibition, and a few days later there in the family WhatsApp group was a photo of four tickets. Two of the family were coming with us. Oh happy days, oh joy...we bought plane tickets and after more mishaps (car and house keys left somewhere in the UK the day before we were due to fly to Vienna) we left the teens alone at home and arrived in Austria on 3rd January.

It started to snow gently...Marcel and I were in heaven, on our own abroad for only the second time since we got married nearly 20 years ago. Here are my sketches from the trip.

This is Entler, a wonderful restaurant that we found after much trudging through deserted snowy streets. I think Sasha, our waiter, is going to join Urban Sketchers. He said he's loved drawing as a kid but had stopped when he hit his teens but wanted to go back to it. Everything was cooked to perfection and couldn't have been more delicious. 

 This Delia's Café where I had to sketch to get over my nerves: I had been persuaded, nay, cajoled into climbing the 365-step tower in St Stephan's Cathedral, which was a trial as there was no handrail, a narrow spiral stone staircase with people coming down as well as up at the same time. Terrifying.

The next day we met Marcel's cousins. Not only did they look after us like royalty, taking us to the most wonderful places - as their guest - but they even put us up in their home, were charm personified, and funny with it - and family! I have just enriched my life by meeting these lovely people.

 Marcel's cousins took us to Heuriger Steinklammer, where we ate pork with crackling, sauerkraut and potato dumplings, and drank wine from the vineyards in the hills above the city. A heuriger is where you find the soul of Austria: carved wooden furniture, kachelofens, waitresses in white blouses and aprons, gorgeous traditional Austrian food and drink.
Left to right: Cousin Ulli, her boyfriend Wastl, Cousin Susi, Marcel.

 This is Café Klimt where we went to recover after the exhibition. Those cakes were sorely needed but the cousins' and husband's cakes were eaten too fast for me to sketch them so I put them in afterwards floating in the ceiling. The only reason there was a bit of mine left to sketch was because it's hard to gobble and sketch at the same time. None of my family made their way in to the sketch either which is a shame.

I bought lots of these for the kids left alone in Ireland (our great frinds and neighbours Lorraine and Sean looked after them as their own while we were away). Now my youngest is googling where to find them in Ireland but the only place that showed up was the Austrian Embassy. Of our three children she is the inheritor of the Austrian soul: lively, funny, and very, very together.
When Marcel was a child his aunties would shower him in Mannerschnitten, these delectable hazelnut wafers.
"Didn't anyone ever say you'd had enough?" I asked.
(My mother is Canadian and brought us up not too overindulge in too much sugar.)
"No, never," said Marcel. "They said. "You like these! Have more!" "

The exhibition was amazing: it was like being transported to another world, not just one 450 years ago, but into a world that really represents my very soul as an artist. Mind blowing and incredibly inspiring. (Weirdly, I recently put together a proposal for a huge mural for my city: it was only after the mock-ups were done that I realised the concept was straight out of a Brueghel "busy picture". I kid you not.)

I love Vienna and my family and I intend to get to know Austria better. And as a sketching destination...who knows what's in the planning?

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