Exhibitions

Beethoven's progressive hearing loss was an almost unimaginable blow to him as a composer and musician. Few people know that he also suffered from numerous other ailments, which he treated with nearly the same meticulous dedication that he devoted to his compositions. Throughout his life, he endured severe abdominal complaints accompanied by painful cramps and digestive disorders. The exhibition focuses on Beethoven’s individual medical conditions and introduces the physicians who treated him — leading authorities in the field of medicine at the time. The therapies ranged from baths in the Danube and medicinal drinking cures to almond oil ear drops and horseradish cotton applications, as well as the then highly innovative methods of electrotherapy, reflecting Beethoven's keen interest in technological advances.

An international team of researchers succeeded in decoding Beethoven's genome using five locks of his hair. The exhibition also explains the methods and findings of this study, the results of which were presented in 2023.