Location: Maximilian’s study, known as the Novara room

Unquestionably the best pictorial work by Archduchess Charlotte, this painting presents a combination of several images sharing the centrality of the marine landscape.

In the central panel, dominated by the blue nuances of the sky and the water, Charlotte depicted the yacht “Phantasie,” the steamer on board which Maximilian and she herself frequently cruised in the Gulf of Trieste and along the upper Adriatic coasts.

The frame contains six small marine landscapes, probably views of places visited by the couple and residences. The oval above contains one of the first images of the castle of Miramare, then completed and clearly recognisable by its architectural profile; the oval below offers a distant view of the island of Lacroma, in Dalmatia, where the Archdukes had planned to restore a Benedictine abbey to use it as their second residence.