19 May 2026 
Quick Read
Hotel Sacher has presented the 2026 edition of its annual Artists' Collection, continuing a project that combines Austria's best-known chocolate cake with contemporary art and charity fundraising. This year, the limited-edition wooden box of the Original Sacher-Torte features a work by the American artist KAWS.
• Hotel Sacher unveiled the 2026 edition of its annual Artists' Collection with US artist KAWS.
The Original Sacher-Torte dates back to 1832, when Franz Sacher created the chocolate cake in Vienna. Over nearly two centuries, the cake became one of Austria's most internationally recognised culinary products and a long-running symbol of Viennese coffeehouse culture. Art, Collecting and CharityThe Sacher Artists' Collection started in 2009. Each year, an invited artist redesigns the traditional wooden box of the Original Sacher-Torte. The editions are limited — this year to 1,000 pieces — and the proceeds are donated to charitable causes.Over the years, the project has involved artists from different generations and disciplines, including Xenia Hausner, Sarah Morris, Hermann Nitsch, Arnulf Rainer, Erwin Wurm, Gottfried Helnwein, Robert Longo, Katherine Bernhardt, Georg Baselitz. In 2010, Austrian caricaturist Gustav Peichl, known as Ironimus, contributed a humorous illustration. According to Sacher, around 16,000 artist-designed boxes have been produced since the initiative began. The 2026 edition supports NF Kinder, an Austrian patient organisation founded in 2013 that works with children and families affected by neurofibromatosis, a rare genetic tumour disease. KAWS Between Street Art and Museum CultureThis year's artist, KAWS — born Brian Donnelly in New Jersey in 1974 — first became known in the 1990s through graffiti and "subvertising" in New York. He altered advertising posters in public spaces by inserting his own characters and visual symbols, including the now-famous X-shaped eyes.KAWS studied illustration at the School of Visual Arts in New York and also worked in commercial animation, painting backgrounds for television productions before moving into fine art, collectible toys and large-scale sculpture. Today, KAWS occupies an unusual position between street culture, contemporary art, fashion and global branding. He has collaborated with companies including Dior, Uniqlo and Nike, while his works are collected by major museums and private collectors worldwide. Vienna currently hosts the exhibition "KAWS. Art & Comix" at Albertina Modern, running from 3 April until 27 September 2026. The show examines the relationship between comics, cartoons, pop culture and fine art. In social media posts such as a video on Instagram, the museum described the exhibition as a dialogue between "high art" and "low art", questioning whether such distinctions still matter in contemporary culture. A large wooden Companion sculpture installed outside the museum became one of the exhibition's visual landmarks. Its monumental presence in public space may remind some viewers of Jeff Koons' floral "Puppy" in front of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. Yet the artistic tone differs considerably. Companion and the Meaning of "SPOKE TOO SOON"Koons' "Puppy" projects optimism and decorative spectacle through flowers and polished surfaces. KAWS' Companion, first introduced in 1999 as a collectible vinyl figure in Japan, is usually more melancholic. The character often appears exhausted, isolated or emotionally vulnerable.The image selected for the Sacher Artists' Collection is "SPOKE TOO SOON" (2021). It shows Companion climbing out from a pile of rubble, with only parts of the body visible at first glance. The title references the English phrase used when optimism proves premature. The work can be interpreted in different ways. On one level, it introduces humour by visually linking the figure's struggle upward with the act of emerging from the cake box itself. At the same time, the image reflects recurring themes in KAWS' work: resilience, uncertainty and human fragility beneath the surface of pop-cultural imagery. In a statement released for the project, KAWS said he liked "the idea of hands climbing out and moving forward", describing the motif as adding "a little humor to the idea of the cake". The limited-edition Sacher Artists' Collection 2026 goes on sale on 19 May online and at selected Sacher locations in Vienna, Salzburg and Seefeld. Image: KAWS and Sacher co-owner Alexandra Winkler present the 2026 Sacher Artists’ Collection at Hotel Sacher Vienna. © Hotel Sacher |