TME
STUDIO
5PECIAL
SUMMER
NUMBER
PRICE FIVE SHILLINGS NET
•••••• OFFICE5-OP-THE5TUDIO
1
and
indicate the highest
form of
ART IN PHOTO -ENGRAVING,
produced exclusively by
THE STRAND ENGRAVING COMPANY, LTD.,
Makers of Finest Process Block* for
Colour & Black -& -White Printing.
Engravers to "THE STUDIO," &c.
146 STRAND, LONDON, W.C.
T«te«r»mi: "STRANCOLOR, LONDON."
Telephone; CI88 Qerr*rd.
Special Bppointmcnt.
NEWMAN
MANUFACTURING ARTISTS' COLOURMAN
Established over 100 Years.
*;'-*>.•
EVERY REQUISITE FOR THE ARTIST
Water ana Oil Colour, Cempera ana Fresco
MINIATURE AND PASTEL
SLOW DRYING WATER COLOURS for Hot Climate J
ARTISTS' BRUSHES OF EVERY DESCRIPTION
C*taU«ve* Free.
Tel. SIM Cerrmr
24 SOHO SQUARE, LONDON, W.
THE ART- REVIVAL
IN AUSTRIA
EDITED BY CHARLES HOLME
OFFICES OF 4THE STUDIO,' LONDON
PARIS, AND NEW YORK MCMVI
N
PREFATORY NOTE
REVIVALS in Art spring from a sense of disquietude concerning the
existing order of things; they are the strivings after truer and nobler
ideals. The efforts made to this end are sometimes encumbered by
false issues, but there is never lacking in them some element of right
which will be recognised and supported by those who have a keen and
real interest in the advancement of human culture.
That there is much of genuine value in the present-day Austrian revival
is apparent to all those who take more than a superficial interest in the
subject, and some effort has been made in the following pages to select
from the various branches of art a few representative examples illustrative
of the new movement.
The Editor desires to express his thanks to those artists who have kindly
assisted him by allowing their work to be reproduced, and to Herr
Hofrat Koch, Herr F. Tempsky, The Miethke Gallery of Fine Arts and
The Modern Gallery, Vienna, The Wiener Werkstaette, Messrs. Redlich &
Berger, Messrs. Gilhofer & Ranschburg, Messrs. Gerlach & Wiedling,
Messrs. Anton Schroll & Co., and the various firms who have permitted
their copyright designs to appear in this volume.
CONTENTS.
SECTION A :
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA, BY LUDWIG HEVESI. — ILLUSTRATIONS AFTER :
Alt, Rudolf von
Andri, Ferdinand ...
Angel i, Prof.
Axentowicz, Prof. Theodor
Darnaut, Hugo ...
Delug, Prof. A
Engelhart, Josef ...
Graf, Ludwig Ferdinand ...
Hampel, Walter ...
Horovitz, Leopold
Hayek, Hans von . . .
Jettmar, Rudolf ...
Kasparides, Eduard
Klimt, Gustav
n »
Liebenwein, Maximilian
» »
Mediz-Pelikan, Emilie
» •>•>
Michalek, Ludwig
Moll, C
MQller, Karl
Nowack, Prof. Hans
Nowak, Anton
Orlik, Emil
Roux, Oswald
Ruszczyc, Ferdynand
Schmutzer, Ferdinand
(f The Patricians' Club, Innsbruck " — water-colour
(in colour) ... ... ... ... ... A 29
t( Slovack Peasants " — pastel (in colour) ... ... A 5
Portrait of Sir H. M. Stanley ... ... ... A 10
Pastel Study for u A Procession " ... ... ... AII
„ Birch Trees by a Canal " ... AI2
„ March Wind " (in photogravure) ... ... A 4
„ The Wind " — pastel (in photogravure) ... ... A 9
A Garden Study ... ... ... ... ... AI3
„ A Quiet Corner" — Tempera Painting ... ... A 15
Portrait of H.I.M. Franz Josef I., Emperor of
Austria and King of Hungary A 16
Portrait of Countess Potocka ... ... ... A 17
(l Winter by the Riverside " A 18
„ The Approaching Storm" — water-colour (in photo-
gravure) ... ... ... ... ... A i
„ Sunrise " — Original Etching ... ... ... A 30
(( A Mountain Lake " — Original Etching... ... A 31
(( Moonlight " (in photogravure) ... ... ... A 8
tl The Big Poplar " (in colour) A 19
Portrait of a Young Lady ... ... ... ... A 20
„ The Adoration of the Magi " — Tempera Painting A 21
„ St. Margaretha " — Tempera Painting A 22
„ A Copse" A 23
Landscape — Original Etching ... ... ... A 38
Portrait of Hofrat Prof. Theodor Gomperz — pastel
(in photogravure) ... ... ... ... A 2
Building the Railway Bridge over the Tsonzo, near
Salcano — Original Etching ... ... ... A 32
„ Beethoven's Home in Heiligenstadt " (in photo-
gravure) A 3
The Church of the Carmelites ... ... ... A 25
,,The Glazier's Shop, Hall (Tyrol)" (in colour)... A 24
Znaim (Moravia) ... ... ... ... ... A 26
4, Sunday" — Original Etching ... ... ... A 35
tl Snow Scene " — coloured etching (in colour) ... A 34
,, A Funeral Procession in Lungau " — Original
Etching .. A 33
„ Ballade " (in photogravure) ... ... ... A 6
Portrait of Josef Joachim — Original Etching ... A 36
i
SECTION A — Continued.
Schmutzer, Ferdinand ... „ The Equestrian " — Original Etching A 37
Stohr, Ernst „ Moonlight " ... A 27
Svabinsky, Max ... ... Portrait of a Lady — wash and pen-and-ink drawing
(in photogravure) ... ... ... ... A 7
Tichy, Hans .Spring" A 28
Uprka, Joza „ A Moravian Wedding " (in colour) ... ... A 14
SECTION B :
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA, BY HUGO HABERFELD. — ILLUSTRATIONS AFTER :
Bilek, Frantisek „ Moses " B 8
Canciani, Alfonso Dante" ... ... ... ... fill
„ „ „ ... ... ... ... ... ... B 13
Engelhart, Josef ... Figure for a Tombstone .. ... ... ... B 5
Gurschner, Gustav ... Monsignore Polus Pasquinelli ... ... ... B 17
Hanak, Anton Portrait Study ... ... ... B 9
Hellmer, Prof. Edmund ... Study for the Goethe Monument in Vienna ... B 10
» „ ... Hygeia B 18
Heu, Josef ... ... The Artist's Mother ... ... ... ... 814
Kiihnelt, Hugo ... ... u Despair" ... ... ... ... B 7
Luksch, Richard Reliefs on the facade of the Sanatorium at Pur-
kersdorf ... ... ... 83 & 4
Marschall, Rudolf ... Pope Leo XIII Big
,, „ ... H.I.M. Franz Josef I., Emperor of Austria and
j, „ ... King of Hungary ... ... ... ... B 20
» „ ... Ludwig Lobmeyer ... ... ... ... ... B2I
Metzner, Prof. Franz ... Nibelung Fountain B 12
» „ ,, ... Portion of the Stelzhamer Monument at Linz ... B 16
Saloun, Ladislav Study for the Huss Monument ... ... ... 815
Seiffert, Franz ... ... The Strauss and Lanner Monument in Rath-
haus Park, Vienna ... B i
Sucharda, Stanislav ... A Study of Children's Heads B 2
Wollek, Carl „ Tamino and Pamina " — Portion of the Mozart
Fountain at Vienna ... ... B 6
SECTION C :
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA, BY HUGO HABERFELD. — ILLUSTRATIONS
AFTER :
Bauer, Leopold A Kitchen c i
» » ••• ••• Children's Room ... ... ... ... ... c 2
» » ••• ... Bathroom executed by R. Masini ... ... ... c 3
Demmger, Wunibald ... Country house in Gutenstein, Lower Austria ... c 5
» » ... Villa in Gutenstein, Lower Austria ... ... c 6
Hoffmann, Prof. Josef ... Covered Pavilion in the Sanatorium at Purkersdorf
executed by the Wiener Werkstaette C 7
" » ••• Entrance to the Sanatorium at Purkersdorf executed
by the Wiener Werkstaette c 8
ii
SECTION C — Continued.
Hoffmann, Prof. Josef ... Hall of the Sanatorium at Purkersdorf executed by
the Wiener Werkstaette ... ... ... eg
„ „ ... Dining-room of the Sanatorium at Purkersdorf
executed by the Wiener Werkstaette ... ... c 10
*„ „ ... Kitchen executed by W. Miiller ... c n
„ „ ... Bedroom „ ,, ... ... ... c 12
„ „ ... Country House ... ... ... ... ... £13
„ „ ... Bent Wood Furniture executed by J. & J. Kohn c 14
„ „ ... Room in white enamel and black oak executed by
the Wiener Werkstaette ... ... ... 015
„ „ ... Country House ... ... ... ... ... c 16
„ ,, ... Bedroom Furniture in bent wood executed by
J. & J. Kohn ... ... ... c 17
„ „ ... Reception-room executed by the Wiener Werk-
staette ... ... c 18
„ „ ... Kitchen ... ... ... ... ... ... 019
„ „ ... Wardrobe executed by the Wiener Werkstaette... c 20
„ >, ... Desk and Chair ... ... ... ... ... C2I
„ „ ... Billiard Room executed by the Wiener Werkstaette c 22
„ „ ... Bedroom executed by W. Miiller... ... ... c 23
„ „ ... Piano in oak stained black executed by Borsendorfer c 24
„ „ ... Card Table and Chairs executed by the Wiener
Werkstaette ... ... ... c 25
„ „ ... Villa in Vienna ... ... ... ... ... c 27
Jurkovic, Dusan ... ... Country House ... ... ... ... ... c 4
Kotera, Jan ... ... Villa in Bohemia ... ... ... ... ... c 28
„ „ Public Offices at Kralove Hradec in Bohemia ... c 29
„ „ ... ... Country House ... ... ... ... ... c 30
Krauss, Baron F. ... ... Design for a Parlour (in colour) ... ... ... 026
Moser, Prof. Koloman ... Kitchen Dresser executed by the Wiener Werk-
staette ... ... ... ... ... ... c 33
„ „ ... ... Bedroom in white maple executed by the Wiener
Werkstaette ... ... ... ... ... c 34
Ofner, Hans ... ... Study executed by Heintschel & Co. ... ... c 35
55 5> R°om 5> .5 c 36
„ „ ... ... Entrance Hall executed by Heintschel & Co. ... c 37
„ „ Entrance Hall „ „ ... c 38
„ „ ... ... Buffet executed by Heintschel & Co. ... c 39
„ „ ... ... Hall Stand „ F. Mittringer ... ... ... c 40
„ „ ... ... Card Room „ Heintschel & Co. ... ... c 41
Ohmann, Prof. ... ... The Hall of Antiquities at Magdeburg ... ... 042
Olbrich, Prof. Garden Villa 043
„ „ ... ... Fountain exhibited at the St. Louis Exhibition ... 044
„ „ Dining Room in the house of the Chaplain-in-
Ordinary to the Grand Duke of Hesse ... c 45
Orlcy, Robert ... ... Study executed by Richard Ludwig ... ... c 46
55 ;> ••• ••• J) »5 55 ••• ••• C 47
iii
SECTION C — Continued.
Orley, Robert Toilet Table in grey beech executed by S. Oppen-
heim c 48
Washstand in grey beech executed by S. Oppenheim c 49
Prutscher, Otto Dining Room executed by Johann Seidl c 50
... Design for an Entrance Hall ... 051
M ... ... Sitting-room executed by L. Hermann 052
Bedroom in elmwood executed by A. Pospischil ... 053
„ „ » » » » ••• c 54
n Bedroom in ash and ebony executed by Carl
Prommel c 55
Urban, Josef Winter Garden 056
Dining-room in mahogany, inlaid with mother-of-
pearl, executed by Hollmann ... c 57
Library in mahogany inlaid with ivory and mother-
of-pearl c 58
Boudoir with walls of purple silk and mahogany
inlaid with mother-of-pearl, executed by Sandor
Jaray c 59
n Music-room in natural mahogany executed by
Hollmann c 60
... Dining-room executed by Hollmann c 61
... Sitting-room in Hungarian natural oak executed
by Sandor Jaray ... ... ... ... ... c 62
n „ ... ... Sitting-room in Hungarian natural oak executed
by Sandor Jaray ... 063
M Boudoir executed by Sandor Jaray ... ... 064
Wagner, Prof. Otto ... Armchair in oak, inlaid with mother-of-pearl and
aluminium, executed by Alex. Albert ... ... c 32
Witkiewicz, Stanislaw ... Country House in Zakopane style, Galicia ... c 31
SECTION D :
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA, BY A. S. LEVETUS. — ILLUSTRATIONS AFTER :
Andri, Ferdinand ... ... Book Illustration
Barwig, Franz
Bohm, Adolf
Czescka, Prof.
Died, Fritz
Ederer, Carl
Emmel, Bruno
» »
Woodcarving — Street Figures
Bookbinding executed by the Wiener Werkstaette...
Casket in beaten silver presented to H.I.M. Franz
Josef I., executed by the Wiener Werkstaette
Textile executed by J. Backhausen & Sons, Vienna
(in colour)
Stained Glass Window executed by Carl Geyling's
Erben ...
Pottery executed by Gebriider Redlich ...
D 40
D 41
D 42
D 74.
D 24
D 67
D 89
D 83
D 2
D 7
IV
SECTION D — Continued.
Engelhart, Josef ...
Wood Intarsia executed by Kehl
„ „
Falke, Baroness ...
»> i> •••
Gurschner, Gustav
Hoffmann, Prof. Josef
Book Illustrations ... ... ... ... .
Tableware executed by Bakalowits & Sons
n » >» ... •
Palm Pot in bronze ... .
Table Lamp „ ... ... ... •
Ash Tray „ ... ... ... .
Fruit Stand executed by the Wiener Werkstaette.
Gold Brooch
Bookbinding
Jewel Box
Clock
Cigar Box
Silver Spoon
»
»
«
«
»»
»
>?
»
n
>»
»
J»
»
»
»
>»
»
»
D7I
D 72
D73
D 34
DS5
D 56
D 6
D68
D 69
D 4
D 13
D 14
D 17
D l8
D 21
Beaten Metalwork
„ „ D 58
„ » D 59
„ „ D 60
„ „ D 6l
„ „ D 62
>» »> ••• » » « >» » D 64
j, „ ••• » » >» » » D 65
„ „ ... Cotton tapestry executed by J. Backhausen & Sons D 85
Hoppe, Emil Table lamps and flower stands executed by Baka-
lowits & Sons ... ... D 48
Kramer, J. V u At the Fountain of Bitir" — Illustration from
„ Ver Sacrum" 032
Lefler, Prof. Heinrich, and ,<The Sleeping Beauty" — book illustration (in
Josef Urban ... ... colour)... ... ... ... ... ... 030
Lefler, Prof. Heinrich, and „ Hanschen, wilt thou Dance ? " — book illustration
Josef Urban (in colour) ... 044
Lenz, Maximilian ... Mural Decoration in hammered brass D 70
Loffler, B.... ... ... Ceramic figure ... ... ... ... ... D i
Luksch-Makowsky, Elena Panel in beaten brass set with stone ... ... DII
„ „ Covers for ventilators in hand- beaten brass ... D 66
Mehoffer, Prof. Josef von H The Archangel Michael" — Mural Decoration... D 79
„ „ u The Archangel Raphael " — Mural Decoration... 080
„ „ „ Notre Dame des Victoires " — Design for a
window ... ... ... ... ... D 81
« » Design for a window ... ... . . ... D 82
Messner, Franz Carpet executed by J. Backhausen & Sons ... 092
» »» » >, >, » D 93
Moser, Prof. Koloman ... Fruit Stand in silver executed by the Wiener
Werkstaette D 3
» » ... Flower Pot in galvanised iron executed by the
Wiener Werkstaette ... ... D 5
v
SECTION D — Continued.
Moser, Prof. Kolomai
Ofner, Hans
» »
Olbrich, Prof.
Powolny, M.
Prutscher, Otto
» »
Schoenthoner, V.
Sika.J. ...
Clock in ebony and beaten silver executed by the
Wiener Werkstaette ... D 12
Silver Brooch set with stones executed by the
Wiener Werkstaette ... ... 016
Bookbinding in morocco executed by the Wiener
Werkstaette D 22
Bookbinding in white buck leather executed by
the Wiener Werkstaette ... ... ... D 23
Glassware executed by Bakalowits & Sons ... D 45
„ » >, ••• D 47
Beaten metalwork executed by the Wiener Werk-
staette D 63
Tray executed by Bakalowits & Sons ... ... D 10
Tableware „ „ „ ... ... D 54
Tapestry in the music-room of the Grand Duke
of Hesse D 84
Ceramic figure ... ... ... ... ... D i
Hand-painted Bonbonniere ... ... ... 015
Cigarette and Card Cases executed by R.Melzer,Jun. D 19
Jewel Case in rosewood executed by Johann Bauwic D 2O
Blotting Case in seal leather executed by R.
Melzer, Jun ,.. D 25
Pocket Book in seal leather executed by R.
Melzer, Jun. ... ... ... ... ... D 26
Leather Blotting Case executed by B. Buchwald D 29
Electric Light Pendants executed by Bakalowits &
Sons ... ... ... ... ... ... D 46
Crystal Flower Bowl executed by Bakalowits & Sons D 49
» j> » » D 5°
Electric Light Pendant „ „ D 52
Glass Mosaic executed by Remygius Geyling ... D 76
Glass Fillings for a sideboard executed by Carl
Geyling's Erben ... D 77, 78
Wool Tapestry executed by J. Backhausen & Sons D 86
Textile executed by J. Backhausen & Sons
(in colour) 087
Textile executed by Carl Giani, Jun. (in colour) D 88
Hand-Knotted Carpet executed by J. Backhauseu
& Sons ... ... ... ... ... D 94
» i> » » » D 95
»» » » » » D 9°
Leather Blotting Case executed by B. Buckwald... D 28
Toiletware executed by J. Boch ... ... ... 08
Red and White Glass Vases executed by Bakalowits
& Sons ... ... ... ... ... D 9
Coffee Service executed by J. Boch ... ... D 10
Electric Light Pendant executed by Bakalowits & Sons D 51
VI
SECTION D — Continued.
Sika, J. ... Electric Light Pendant executed by Bakalowits &
Sons D 53
Stohr, Ernst Illustration to a Poem. From (1 Ver Sacrum " ... 031
Stooss, Betty Cushion D 97
„ ... ... Portion of a Table Cover ... ... ... ... D 98
Sumetsberger, E. ... ... Leather Jewel Case executed by B. Buckwald ... D 27
Taschner, Ign. .., ... Book Illustration ... ... ... 035
» »» ••• D36
„ » -• - D37
„ „ „ 038
„ „ » ... D 43
Tauschek, Otto ... ... „ ... ... D 39
Urban, Josef (see Prof.
Heinrich Lefier,).
Wachsmann, Rosa ... Textile executed by S. E. Steiner & Co. ... D 90
„ „ ... Design for a wall paper ... ... ... ... 091
Zelezny, Franz Woodcarving — Martin Luther ... D 75
The Copyright of each Illustration in this Volume is reserved by the Owner.
VII
A 1 RUDOLF JETTMAR
THE APPROACHING STORM"
-WATER-COLOUR DRAWING
IN THE MODERN GALLERY,
VIENNA
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
BY LUDWIG HEVESI
,HE Sun of Modern Taste rose in the West.
It needed some years to enable its beams to
reach the art of Austria, but slowly did light and
warmth arrive, amid difficulties which had their
natural causes. In matters of art Vienna always
inclined to conservatism, for the reason that
Flanders and a large part of Italy were for a long
time Austrian. The glorious Venetian and
Flemish painters of the great days still give their
stamp to the Viennese galleries, which are among the richest in the
world. Vienna is, inter alia, a Rubens city of the first rank, and it is
no wonder that the powerful Austrian painter, Hans Canon (1829 —
1885), should have lived and died a student of Rubens in partibus — a
sort of posthumous Jordaens. Hans Makart himself (1840 — 1884),
who inaugurated a period of splendid colour, and intoxicated the whole
of central Europe with the hues of his palette, was a new Paolo
Veronese, and had a most dazzling effect on the unstrung nerves
of a Jin de stick. It was indeed the last brilliant blaze of an old
" Gallery art," which was destined to be followed by a new art based
on nature. Add to that the baroque traditions of the great Theresian
century. Vienna had come down to us as a beautiful baroque city, and
in every street there still stand the magnificent palaces and cathedrals,
dating from the time of Bernini and Juvara, for this spirit is not
to be lightly thrown off. On the other side, the Academy of Fine
Arts was a solid fortress of the historical point of view in art and
of conventional taste. Its chief teachers of painting were pupils of
Rahl, the monumental painter of the city extension (Eisenmenger
and Griepenkerl), and its architects were those of the historical style,
the " Gothic " Schmidt, the " Greek " Hansen, and the " Cinque-
centist " Ferstl ; and from this Academy — history-taught and
history-teaching — there arose the Society of the " Kunstlergenossen-
schaft," whose members had the lead in the " Kiinstlerhaus."
Simultaneously there existed a leaning towards Parisian colour.
August von Pettenkofen (1822 — 1889) had come into contact with
Meissonier and the French painters of the East — Fromentin, Gerome,
Diaz, and others ; but he found in Hungary, in the valley, of the
Tisza, whose praises had already been sung by Lenau, a European
Egypt of 1 200 geographical square miles, with a lovely little Nile
A i
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
and a life as sunny as that of the East. His work was of supreme
force in point of light and shade, done in the warm brown tones of
the " little masters " of the Netherlands and their Parisian imitators.
And at the same time the landscapist, Emil J. Schindler (1842 —
1892), was striking the clear, lyrical notes of the Masters of
Fontainebleau. These two artists were free, true spirits, born a
little before their time.
Of genuine forerunners of modern painting there was certainly no
lack. Of recent years they have been reverently disinterred, and
their works, displayed at special exhibitions, have aroused general
astonishment. Thus appeared several times the great genre and
landscape painter, Ferdinand Georg Waldmuller (1793 — 1865), who
was deposed from his position as Professor at the Academy because
he painted in the open air, in full sunlight, — at that time con-
sidered far too advanced — and by means of pamphlets strongly urged
the reform of the Academy root and branch. Another leader in the
revolt — alas ! a sadly embarrassed one — was Anton Romako
(1832 — 1889), the memory of whom was revived quite recently by
an exhibition. It was the rehabilitation of one scorned in his own
time, one who in the struggle for freedom strove to break his bonds.
He was the author of the bizarre but thoroughly nerve-inspiring
picture, Admiral Tegethoff in the Sea-jight at Lissa. Of the same
type, a man of headstrong artistic obstinacy, yet not devoid of
discretion, keeping himself well under control, was the landscapist
Theodore von Hermann (1840 — 1895), the real precursor of the
" Secession." He, too, wasted his time in the Kiinstlerhaus, and then
enjoyed a posthumous fame in the " Secession." The auction sale of
his property was a great event in Vienna. His favourite motto was
" truth." He strove to be absolutely true to nature, and hated every-
thing in the way of studio-made compromise. Indeed, he painted
his frost-covered winter scenes seated in the snow, like an Esquimo,
thereby catching the cold from which he died. Yet another nature
essentially the same, but of a more delicate fibre, was Rudolf von
Alt (1812 — 1905), who only a year ago died, a Methuselah of ninety-
four. Like the Spire of St. Stephen's, which he painted so often
in all lights, he, too, is one of Vienna's signmarks. In his case we
have to consider a whole dynasty, for his father Jacob (1789 — 1872)
was an excellent painter of city views, and his brother Franz (born
in 1821) is so still. The " Veduta," or view, was in the family blood.
But Rudolf was also highly interesting as a figure painter, and the
crowds of figures in his views of Vienna form a rich source of infor-
mation, covering about eighty years of Viennese life. His abandon-
A ii
A 2 UUSWiQ MICHAL.EK
HOFRAT PROF. THEODOR
GO MPERZ— PASTEL
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
ment of portrait painting, while still a young man, was a sheer act
of friendship to the lithographic portraitist, Kriehuber, with whom
he did not wish to come into rivalry. Rudolf was the leader of
the Viennese "Veduta" painting, the true biographer of Vienna, old
and new, the indefatigable chronicler in whose water-colours and
marvellous pencil-drawings a whole world of picturesque beauty,
now demolished, continues to live. His was an honest, cheerful,
and domestic character, and he was as a painter quite simple, ever
absorbed in his task, and producing easily and tirelessly — in fact, a
real type of the Austrian and the Viennese in the days of the " Waltz
King," Johann Strauss, and the local, dramatic geniuses, Nestroy and
Gallmeyer. Sprung from the Viennese people, he was a genuine son of
the soil, to which he clung all his life, full of its scent — the " Wiener
Luft " — full of the spirit of the century, on whose sundial, year in,
year out, the shadow of St. Stephen's Spire performed its round.
In Vienna they call such an one an " Urwiener." Moreover, he made
several journeys, which extended even tov the Crimea and to Sicily.
In Italy he painted many delicious pictures, at first working in oils,
in which he was always somewhat heavy. He never went to
Paris, and thus remained free from its influences. He was original
through and through, yet at no time did he allow his originality
to ossify into mannerism. He gladly let himself come in con-
tact with all the tendencies of the period ; he was always
up-to-date and opportune, and we can immediately tell the
period of his pictures, even though they be undated. It is
remarkable that the author of the minute detail work of early years,
of the Biedermaier period and the so-called " Vormarz," should
have acquired, in the freer and more decorative Makart days, such
breadth and richness of brush, as though he had never had aught to
do with the laboured drawings of old Vienna ; and in later years,
when his trembling hand made writing almost impossible to the old
man, he invented for himself a method of forming his characters
with the tip of his brush, point by point, never failing to hit the
right place. Then came the " pointillist " movement in Paris, and
one saw that from sheer physical necessity Alt had long anticipated
it. Thus all the styles and modes of painting of a whole century
are reflected in his work. Even in his early water-colours, done
in the thirties of the century, one often finds him busy with
the problems of to-day — as when he depicts the play of the full
sunlight on some broad plane, or paints in oils a Viennese eclipse of
the sun (1842) simply as an atmospheric occurrence, as a study, quite
in the modern spirit. At the sale of his works by auction, in
A iii
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
February last, the lots numbered 487 (two-thirds of which were small
pencil studies) and realised 181,000 Kronen. There one came across
many " incunabula " of modern painting. Rudolf von Alt is
now on the road towards the attainment of international celebrity,
after living out his long life in bourgeois modesty, content with
nothing more than mere local appreciation. Indeed, of recent years
the Berlin historical exhibitions have recognised his rank. He was
the great, the real recorder of Vienna's doings, just as Adolf von
Menzel was the faithful chronicler of Berlin. Two diverse, yet
at the same time parallel natures, which an essentially historical
century created its representative artists. Menzel, as a son ot
politico-historical Prussia, as a contemporary of Ranke, depicted the
story, internal and external, of his native land ; while Alt, product
of a Southern land full of charm of form and colour, native of a
delightfully situated art-city, became, before all else, the delineator or
his own locality, its landscapes and its views. When, on the 3rd of
April, 1897, nineteen young artists came together, to found the
Viennese " Secession," they chose as their leader Rudolf von Alt, and
he accepted the title. They found him young enough, and he felt
himself not too old to be young in their society.
Meanwhile the " Secession " had become absolutely indispensable in
Vienna. A too businesslike point of view prevailed at the Kiinstler-
haus, manifesting itself in the shape of something like a protective
duty on art. For many years the exhibitions had prohibited the
admission of all foreign contributions, in order to preserve the
market for the home artist. Thus the great public was kept in
complete ignorance of the various transformations which Western
art was undergoing. Viennese painting might continue to hobble
peacefully along the old, well-worn track ! International exhibi-
tions were few and far between, but the third of these (in the
spring of 1894) gave some sign of what was going on in the West.
This sign came, not from France — which still sent nothing but
officially-approved works, naught of Manet and his school — but
from England. For, in addition to Leighton, Herkomer and Alma-
Tadema (whose Fredegonde was bought by the reigning Prince ot
Liechtenstein for 15,000 gulden, and bequeathed later to the
Modern Gallery), one saw here for the first time the " Boys of
Glasgow" — Brown, Cameron, Reid Murray, Pirie, Macaulay
Stevenson, and others, whose open-air work caused a complete upset
of existing ideas. The storm thus raised came to a climax in
December of the same year, when the entire "Secession" of Munich
appeared as guests in the Kunstlerhaus. The old-fashioned public
A iv
A 3 O. MOLL
„ BEETHOVEN'S HOME
IN HEILIGENSTADT"
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
and its antiquated painters jeered loudly, but the iron wall which
hitherto had formed the horizon of Viennese art was broken down.
Some young artists were elected as members of the "Jury" of the
Kiinstlerhaus, and soon there followed exhibitions of modern
pictures — such as Segantini's Two Mothers, Dettmann's Hei/ige
Nacht, &c., which of course aroused another storm of criticism.
In the "Jury " itself there were hard battles to be fought, and finally
the " young men " withdrew, to form their own society, the " Seces-
sion." From that time forward Viennese painting gravitated towards
the " Secession " until the schism occurred last year. It modernised
the whole art of Vienna, so that even the Kiinstlerhaus itself was
compelled by force of circumstances to fall into line. Fresh forces
were moving in all directions, the rejected of former "juries"
emerged from obscurity into fame, and other groups of young
artists were formed, notably the " Hagenbund," and applied art
followed in the path defined by art pure and simple.
Forthwith there sprang into prominence an artist who was destined
to establish a style — Gustav Klimt, born in 1862, the most
significant and most original force in painting since Makart. His
name is, as it were, a battle-cry ; to many people he became and
has remained a veritable bete noire. His three great ceiling paintings
for the aula of the University — Philosophy, Medicine, and Juris-
prudence— formally signify three years of the aesthetic civil war
during which controversy raged even among the professors them-
selves until finally the artist, who was treated by the Minister,
von Hartel, in the most correct manner possible, voluntarily
withdrew the pictures and returned the sum he had already received
for them. Klimt is the absolute, go-ahead, unmitigated artist, the very
reverse of an everybody's painter. He has no regard for aught save
his own artistic vision, and goes on his way, silent and reserved.
Anything in the way of speculation with regard to the commercial
side of his work, any thought of taking notice of the oft-repeated
charge of morbidness, is absolutely remote from his mind. The
segment pictures in the staircase of the Hofkunstmuseum and the
ceiling paintings in the Hof-Burgtheater reveal a graceful draughts-
man and a powerful colourist of the Makart type, with a certain
suggestion of his luxury of hues. But the " unrest of the modern
soul" soon asserted itself. In the play of light and vibration of
colour, as exemplified strongly in his Schubert, he allies himself with
the most modern tendencies. The nerves of a nervous age quiver
at fresh contacts. New aspirations arise in form and in colour, a new
vision appears, the latent hauntings of everyday fancifulness, the
A v
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
unwitting dreamings of a world to all seeming so wide-awake. Jan
Toorop observed these phenomena, but in another way. Whistler
also saw them, and he, too, with other eyes. Klimt was akin to the
one, in his fantastic scenes which are beyond anything seen before in
their ornamental tendency ; he reminded of the other in his women's
portraits, wherein not the body only, but the soul, the temperament,
seems to be revealed, wherein one sees not alone the coursing of the
blood through the veins, but the very disposition of the nerves.
His portraits and his landscapes are generally admired, and even the
Philistine has by now become accustomed to them. They have
been much imitated, and already Vienna has a plentiful supply of
false Klimts. But his phantasmagorias, great and small, are still
beyond the comprehension of the simpleton in art, for they really
mark something new in ornamental painting. Whole series of pencil
sketches from nature have been made for the terrific realism in every
face, in every piece of foreshortening, in every pair of wrung hands.
Something like a mosaic of vague metals and enamels, lovely as
jewels to the eye, like the feerie of the Byzantine mosaics at
Ravenna, Palermo and the Church of St. Mark, is the Fata Morgana
which leads the artist on. The masterpiece among these trance-seen
visions of his was the fresco decoration of one of the rooms at the
exhibition of Max Klinger's Beethoven. A long frieze depicted the
yearnings of unhappy humanity, which first seeks help from a knight
in armour of gold, then finds consolation amid the rose-blooms of
Poetry, and finally comes to Joy itself in the Freude of Beethoven
and Schiller (" Seid umschlungen Millionen"). But on the way
mankind must first pass by a multitude of human sins and vices,
the prince of which is the hellish monster, Typhceus. And this
Typhceus fresco is the most extreme example one has yet seen ot
Klimt's orgie of ornamentality. For months the artist worked on
this decoration without fee or reward, content to lavish such splendour
on this one opportunity, though it was believed that his pictures would
subsequently have to be erased. But happily it was found
possible to detach them uninjured from the walls, and they passed
into the possession of a lover of art. Klimt's art is one of the
highest refinement, but it is notably lacking in that "sweetness"
which has made so much of the art of the igth century unacceptable
to us. On the contrary, it has a certain harsh loveliness, like that of
the Primitives, and the eye leaves it refreshed. Remarkable too
is the originality of his handiwork. It suffices to look at a square
inch of one of his paintings to recognise his touch immediately.
Next among the " Secessionists " to demand notice are Giovanni
A vi
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
Segantini (1858 — 1899), from Arco, Southern Tyrol, and Josef
Mehoffer, the Pole, born in 1869, a professor at the Academy of
Arts at Cracow. Of Segantini it is not necessary to say much
here, for he was one of the best known painters of our time.
Even that quaint method of his mature period, to paint by tiny
single strokes, his simple " divisionism," was sufficient to make
him unique. Moreover he is highly modern in the bold truth
with which he depicts an earth nigh to the heavens, and in
the " soul " — whereby I mean the poetical pitch and ethical
glorification — which his absolute fidelity to truth in nature
acquires. But MehofFer is now the most powerful colourist in the
monarchy. From the portraits and " society " pictures of his
early days, when he resembled a Spaniard of the Zuloaga or Anglada
type, he went on to mighty colour work, such as the stained-glass in
the Cathedrals of Cracow and Plock, and more particularly in the
Cathedral of Fribourg, Switzerland. Therein he revels in unre-
strained luxury of form and colour, revealing, as it were, the
deliberate abandon of the artistic temperament in a way scarcely to
be seen elsewhere. In these glass-paintings the art of the church is
suddenly raised to unexpected heights. Many forceful talents are
now being specially applied to the solution of the ecclesiastical art
problem. This is the period of Otto Wagner, who is now building
in Vienna the first church designed on modern principles. Last
winter the "Secession" held an important exhibition of Ecclesiastical
Art, in which the Beuron style was for the first time publicly
displayed. The Benedictine monks of Beuron Abbey, in the
principality of Hohenzollern, have, thanks to the creative skill of
Father Desiderius Lenz, possessed a new style of ecclesiastical art
for thirty years past. To complete this presentation of the work of
the Beuron school certain Viennese painters took part in the labour
of painting a baptismal chapel. Each picture was by a
different hand, composed in a different spirit, so naturally there
was no very harmonious result, good as Was each separate portion
itself: but here I will do no more than mention the charming glass-
painting by Ederer.
Among the style-inclined painters of the " Secession " there are
several who strike an individual note, for example, Adolf Bohm
(born in 1861) in the ornamental stylise landscape, with a strong
leaning in the direction of applied art ; Alfred Roller (born in
1846), who is at present a reformer of the established state of things
at the Imperial Court Opera, where the classical scenes owe their
novel anti-realistic form entirely to him ; Rudolf Jettmar (born in
A vii
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
1869), chiefly an etcher of fantastically-heroic scenes ; Max
Lebenwein (born in 1869), water-colourist, interpreter of knightly
legend and saga, and J. M. Auchentaller, whose ornamental
whirlings are influenced by modern English examples.
The popular element has two clever and truthful exponents in Josef
Engelhart (born in 1864) and Ferdinand Andri (born in 1871).
Engelhart is the son of a wealthy citizen, and lives in one of the
most popular suburbs of Vienna. His brusque scenes of Viennese
life are full of jole de vivre and fresh colour. There is strength
and there is race therein. At the same time he is a man of inter-
national culture, who has painted in all kinds of styles in the
ateliers of modern Paris, in the churches of Spain, and beneath the
blue sky of Sicily. His plastic work, too, is ever gaining in strength,
and he has been producing, in the way of applied art, original
things full of excellent workmanship. In the house of the well-
known manufacturer, Herr Tausig, there is a room ornamented
by Engelhart with large scenes from Wieland's " Oberon," most
fancifully and gracefully disposed in the true decorative manner.
Andri, on the other hand, is the jovial illustrator of peasant life, of
which he depicts the various types and costumes (notably the gaily-
coloured cottons) with all vividness, and preferably in pastel.
Moreover, he has higher aspirations, and, as occasion serves, rises to
great symbolic altitudes, as in the mural painting in the baptismal
chapel already mentioned ; and, lastly, his carving shows real
maestria. Another important personality is Carl Moll (born in
1861), one of the founders of the " Secession," which, however, he has
quitted, to join the "New Secession." As a painter he proceeds from
the landscape school of Schindler, having since rambled in the Hansa
towns of North Germany, in the footsteps of Gotthard Kuehl.
But only in the "Secession" did he became quite modern in the matter
of light and colour problems, and that attitude he still adopts to the
utmost extent. A virtuoso in regard to technique, he has had con-
siderable success with his interiors, landscapes and views. But
his personal r6le in the modernising of the art life of Vienna consists
in his restless energy in the service of a pet idea, and in the sociable,
business-like and diplomatic qualities which are requisite in the
struggle to maintain these interests. He was the very leaven of the
new movement, a Minister of Fine Arts without a portfolio. A
man of the Ideal was also Johann Victor Kramer (born in 1862),
Engelhart's student companion in Spain and Sicily, and afterwards
an Eastern traveller who put the sun of Memphis and Baalbek on his
palette. His pictures of Palestine have a deep, almost a sacred tone.
A viii
A 5 !
.SLOVACK PEASANTS "-PASTEL.
Engettu
most
life are
and tht
nation.*'
blue
known man1
by Engelhar
fancifully an
An.
whi<
coloured
Moreove
.it syi
chapel a
mat
186
quii
lanai
towns o
But
in r.
• e and t
struggle to maintaii
movement, a
man of the Ideal
. rt's st;
Max
knightly
hate ornamental
;i Josef
in 1871).
,ie of the
Viennese
strength
i of inter-
n the
neath the
: strength,
, original
of the well-
oom ornamented
•beron," most
rcorative manner,
of peasant life, of
notably the gaily-
iy in pastel,
-erves, rises to
the baptismal
v s real
(born in
ver, he has
is from
the Hansa
Kuehl.
the matter
, to the
has had con-
Aiv;i views. But
,na consists
: ible,
ite in the
leaven of the
it a portfolio. A
K>rn in 1862),
and afterwards
Baalbek on his
moftt a sacred tone.
A 5 FERDINAND ANDRI.
,SLOVACK PEASANTS"-PASTEL.
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
His religious works, too, he steeps in the full magic of the plein air.
Like him, Rudolf Bacher (born in 1862), now a professor at the
Academy, comes from the good school of Leopold Miiller — " the
Egyptian." He possesses the serious, historical style — the solid,
substantial art of painting ; furthermore, he is one of our leading
portrait-painters, and, incidentally, a delightfully humorous delineator
of dragons and other "fearful wild- fowl," and a plastic artist to
boot. He also did sacred work, and other such pictures have been
done by Wilhelm Bernatzik (born in 1853), w^° a^so aspired to
Viennese genre and lastly to modern landscape. He belongs to the
energetic class, is an abundant producer, and was taught in Paris.
After Schindler's death Eugen Jettel (1845 — 1901) occupied a fore-
most place among our landscapists. He lived mostly in Paris, and
belonged to the Barbizon School. A delicate, lyrical nature, to whom
everything was a bright, sunny idyll. In his later years his art
blossomed forth again in a series of delicate pictures of the Istrian
coast, whose solitary, remote nature prompted him, under the
influence of the sunshine, to the tenderest confessions. Ludwig
Sigmundt (born in 1860) takes a high place to-day as a delicate and
emotional painter of landscape. Inwardly he remains ever devoted to
his familiar Steiermark scenery, and attempts nothing extraordinary ;
but everyday Nature speaks to him in pleasant, intimate tones,
and her light and her air permeate his canvases. The charm he has
extracted from homely themes has often caused surprise. The same
simple wild-flowers are picked with firmer grasp by Anton Nowak
(born in 1865), who grows in ability year by year. A poetical
dreamer in landscape and figure-work, who had early and notable
success, is Maximilian Lenz (born in 1860), and he has, moreover,
learnt the secret of the exotic world of the Pampas of Argentina.
A moonlight romancer is Ernst Stohr (born in 1865); a pensive
teller of fairy-tales, Friedrich Konig (born in 1857), over w^ose
shoulder the " muse " of old Schwind is still peeping. In 1897 there
returned to Vienna the brilliant Parisian illustrator — erstwhile
officer in the Austrian service — Felician, Baron Myrbach, who was
born in 1853. He came back to be the Director of the re-organised
" Kunstgewerbe-Schule," a post he has now resigned. A good
all-round man, skilled in figure-work and landscape, he nowadays
affects the modern method. W. List, Anton Miiller, the " Viennen-
sia " painter, Otto Friedrich and Hans Tichy also belong to this
group.
In the " Hagenbund " there are also several painters who stand out
as individual forces. Ludwig Ferdinand Graf (born in 1868) went,
A ix
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
when quite young, to Paris and Brittany, and brought back with
him sundry experiments with broken and pulverised colours, piquant
discords and dainty absurdities. In addition to interiors, landscapes
and portraits he devotes himself to visions such as never were
seen ; they are very personal, even when he has a model. Each
year he becomes different, ever seeking something new, but his
tendency is always towards style. Indeed, in painting landscape he
has already produced interesting work. Altogether original is Wilhelm
Hejda (born in 1868), painter, sculptor, maker of furniture and
discoverer of polychromes in new ceramic elements. Here we have
simply to remember his pictures, which in their simplicity of pro-
duction often attain to charming effects, and are always possessed of
a certain style which commands attention. An uncommonly skilful
designer, inventor, water-coloiirist, draughtsman, illustrator and
costumier is Heinrich Lefler (born in 1863), who, in conjunction with
his brother-in-law, Josef Urban, the architect, illustrates fairy-tale
books, large and small, in colours, and, furthermore, has decorated the
Rathskeller in the Town Hall with mural pictures of jovial Viennese
life throughout the centuries. He was director of the costume
department at the Imperial Court Theatre, and is now a professor at
the Academy. He has not lacked for models to imitate — Boutet de
Monvel and Vogeler — yet he has much original skill and charm, and
the ready dexterity of the born improvisator. To a somewhat older
generation belongs another member of this group, Alexander D.
Goltz (born in 1 857), who, like all the pupils of Anselm Feuerbach,
sets his poetic feeling in a minor key. He has followed the currents
of his time as best he could, without cutting out a special course
for himself. From the atmosphere of Paris, with its cabarets and
cafe-chant ants, Raimund Germela (born in 1868) came home a full-
colourist, at least on a small scale. His canvases overflow with the
pleasure of living, especially in his park scenes, which display a stylise
luxuriance. They are closely allied to the work of Somoff and the
" Simplicissimus," but without their humour. On occasion he makes
a "raid" into the domain of Socialism. Among the landscapists of
this group must be mentioned Kasparides (since resigned), Konopa,
Wilt, Ranzoni, Zoff, Ameseder, -Suppantschitsch and Baar. In the
" Hagenbund " we also came to know the Dresden couple, Karl
Mediz (born in 1868) and Emilie Mediz-Pelikan (born in 1862).
They followed an almost identical path of expression and develop-
ment, which led them to Dachau, to Uhde and to the Belgian fishing
village of Knokke — some of the head-quarters of impressionist students.
Both husband and wife have a picturesquely fantastic vision of things,
A x
••
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
which, in their representation of ice-clad mountains, becomes quite
stylise ; and in contrast to a background of panoramic character, the
foreground is depicted with almost microscopic accuracy. Thus Karl
Mediz paints every thread, every hair in his life-size Eismanner, which
made his reputation and now hangs in the Modern Gallery ; and
in the same way Emilie Mediz-Pelikanin, her slender little trees
in tubs, which she generally likes to place on some terrace on a
Southern sea, depicts even the tiniest crack in the bark. They have
both painted much in these Southern seas — chiefly about Corfu — and
have studied the blue deep with a bird's-eye view as it were. Karl
Mediz is also a master of portraiture. He has done quite a series of
portraits of persons in Dresden society, all executed with minutest
precision.
The contribution of the Slav races to the artistic assets of the
Monarchy is very considerable. With them aesthetics are at the
same time politics, and artistic growth means also an increase of
national importance. The success of such a standard is naturally
great, though in a land divided in its language there is of necessity
a tendency to division of materials and means. Thus in Galicia we
have Poles and Ruthenes ; in Bohemia Czechs and Germans. The
Poles have already great traditions, and a patriotically historic art in
the great paintings of Jan Matejko (1838 — 1893), and Artur
Grottger, who portrayed the stirring tragedy of the martyrs to free-
dom (1837 — 1867). But modern times have even here wrought
great changes, and the national temperament now seeks expression
rather in the highly-coloured and "ethnographische" style. We have
already mentioned the window paintings by Mehoffer at Fribourg.
These, as also those of Stanislaus Wyspianski and other religious
painters like Leon Wyczolkowski (b. 1852), are of a romantic and
symbolical character that verges on the fantastic. Nature and the
various phases of the native peasant life are represented in an
impressionist manner by Joseph Chelmonski (born in 1852), Jan
Stanislawski (born in 1860), and more stylistically by Ferdinand
Ruszczyc and others. A note of the past is struck in certain
political paintings of a seditious character, such as Etape (Students
on the way to Siberia) by Jacek Malczewski (born in 1855). A
more international spirit of the stamp of the newer Munich school
is that of Julian Falat (b. 1853), one of the most enterprising of
snow-painters. A hunting guest of the Emperor William, he has
immortalised many imperial shooting scenes. He is the director of
the School of Art in Cracow. Adalbert Kossak (born 1857) *s a
painter of battle-pieces and Peter Stachiewicz (b. 1858) a delicate
A xi
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
legendary painter of the life of the Virgin. Kasimir Poehwalski
(b. 1856), at present professor in Vienna, a painter of elegant por-
traits in the manner of Bonnat, is now striking out in a more
modern style. Zygmunt Ajdukiewicz (b. 1862) is a genre painter in
an older style with a predilection for painting horses, also an illus-
trator of the revolutionary episodes of Kosciuszko. Thadeus
Ajdukiewicz (b. 1852) is a refined painter of equestrian, military and
sporting portraits.
The Czechs, though they entered the lists later than the Poles,
have, nevertheless, soon become their artistic equals, standing high
in the modern Parisian art world, as in the case of the late Ludek
Marold (1865 — 1898), who in Paris and Munich was considered a
brilliant genre painter, mostly in water-colours ; and Alfons Mucha
(born 1860), Sarah Bernhardt's poster artist and illustrator of " Use
Princesse de Tripoli," etc., who, however, never lost his early piquant
peculiarities of style, for instance, his wire-like curling of women's
hair. Parisian elegance, which however found a speedy limit, was
also a characteristic of Adalbert Hynais (b. 1854), who did his best
work in the auditorium of the Burg-Theater. He is a professor in
Prague, with the military painter Rudolf von Ottenfeld, the painter
of sunshine Franz Thiele, who studied in Italy, the Parisian
pointillist Vlaho Bukovac, a Dalmatian, and the over-sophisticated
mystic Maximilian Pirner. Much fame has been won by the two
landscape painters, Antonin Slavicek (b. 1870) and Antonin Hudecek
(b. 1872), both ardent seekers after new colour effects.
At the present time the four principal artists of the Czecho-Slav
nation are Hans Schwaiger, Joza Uprka, Max Svabinsky, and Emil
Orlik. Hans Schwaiger (b. 1854) is the quaintest. His name
conjures up visions of Wandering Jews, Anabaptists, Sorceresses,
Gallows-birds, the Gnome, King Rubezahl, arid the Waterman ot
the frog-pond. He is an untiring fairy-tale teller, and seems to have
lived through all his brilliant extravaganzas and blood-curdling ghost
stories. For many years he dwelt in a wooden house in the middle of
a wood on a spur of the Karpathians. A woodman, well versed in all
the secrets of the forest and of the slovaque legends, abroad an
intimate of poachers and vagrants, and at home surrounded by
ancient curios, a dabbler in magic, something of an alchemist,
magician and devil worshipper, no wonder that Chaucer's
"Canterbury Tales" and the old Simplicius Simplicissimus furnish
his favourite reading and much of his inspiration. He is an
"original," and what he draws or paints — mostly in water-colours —
displays a gnarled rusticity and a queer fanaticism. The spirit
A xii
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
of the old German woodcutter seems to have revisited him, the
sturdy humour of the cobbler Hans Sachs, and the perilous practical
joke of the Thirty Years' War. His principal picture is an enormous
water-colour, The Anabaptists, an incalculable turmoil of quaintly-
apparelled and desperate-looking people of that reckless period,
masters and servants, soldiers and women, fanatics and fools, demi-
gods and cripples, all massed together, a kaleidoscopic picture of the
age. Schwaiger's humour, his phantasy, his spirit lore, his inventive
power are inexhaustible, his paintings are legion. Later he found
his subjects in the old towns of the Netherlands, but since he became
professor at Prague, he has given little of his art to the world.
The second "original" is the Moravian peasant-painter, Joza Uprka
(b. 1862), who lives and works in the unpronounceable Hroznova
Lhota. His invariable theme is the peasant-life of that place,
whose unquenchable colour and movement he depicts on his
canvases. These weddings, rustic feasts, harvestings, avalanches
of gay colours in the most brilliant-,, sunshine, excite much
interest, though they are quite drawing-room affairs modified
into prettiness. According to him his country only produces
beauties. His sudden success, however, has not spoilt him ; he
works earnestly at the conquest of the whole scale of Nature's mood
as he finds it at his threshold. Filled with the same patriotic
spirit, centred on his own span of earth, is Jaroslav Spillar, who
unfortunately has of late become mentally deranged. He devoted
himself exclusively to the portrayal of one of the most ancient races,
the Chodes in western Bohemia, who observe ancient customs and
preserve a most magnificent national costume. An energetic and
productive genius is Max Svabinsky (b. 1873) of Prague, a graphic
artist who devotes much attention to contemporary portraiture.
He has devised a peculiar technique of coloured pen-sketches.
Over a heavy groundwork of strokes he lays a delicate layer of water
or pastel colouring. The effect is original and rich ; also in life-
sized heads, figures and scenes the technique is effective, and has
made him a specialist in this line. Again, there is Emil Orlik
(b. 1870), a man of unusual talent, a universal painter in all styles, but
with a genial turn for realism. He passed many years in Japan, where
in friendly intercourse with the artists of the country he fathomed
the secrets of the Japanese coloured woodcuts, which he varied and
appropriated to his own use. Besides this Japanese speciality he has
of late years turned his attention to things nearer home. The old
houses and courtyards of the Bohemian and Moravian villages, the
old-fashioned costumes of the provincials, their neatly kept interiors,
A xiii
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
the whole sober, dainty, childish world which in each dwelling
revolves round its centre point, the family patriarch, he portrays with
a naive virtuosity all his own. Also as water-colourist, pastellist,
etcher, lithographer, draughtsman in all styles, he is a great inventive
personality. The leading German collections (Dresden, etc.) possess
all his work. Last year he was nominated professor at Berlin.
In the old Vienna Artists' Association, whose home is the Kiinstler-
haus, modern views are now universally adopted, though there are still
many representatives of older schools who preserve their adherents.
In the field of portrait-painting conservatism is still a strong element.
Two of the elder celebrities of this branch are Leopold Horovitz
(born in 1843) and Heinrich von Angeli (born in 1840). Both have
painted distinguished personages for years past. In the seventies
of the last century Angeli was Court painter of Austria, Prussia and
England, in partibus. Queen Victoria and her daughter, afterwards
the Empress Frederick, employed him considerably ; the English
nobility sat to him gladly ; so did the Viennese Court, with the
Emperor Franz Josef at its head. Horovitz had his aristocratic
clientele chiefly among the Hungarian and Polish magnates, the cele-
brated politicians of those countries, e.g., Koloman Tisza and Pulszky,
and interesting women such as the Princess Sapieha, Countess Potocka.
the Berlin beauty, Countess von der Groeben, and the Viennese
lady, Frau Dr. Loew, of whom he did a remarkable portrait. The
best recent portraits of the Emperor Franz Josef are by Horovitz :
one of these, in British uniform, was painted for his English
regiment. These masters combine the qualities that were so highly
prized at that time, and many of their paintings have successfully
resisted the changes of fashion. It is interesting that they should
both have been born in Hungary ; moreover, there are three
Hungarians now figuring prominently in Vienna as " high-life "
portrait-painters — Philip Laszlo, Arthur von Ferraris, and Josef
Koppay. Although they have become more and more firmly estab-
lished in Vienna, yet they cannot be considered as belonging,
properly speaking, to the school of Austrian painting. Further-
more, their international fame keeps them busy in all parts of the
world, and they are continually travelling from place to place. All
three have their peculiarities in the matter of style, and on these their
positions depend. Laszlo proceeded by way of Lenbach towards
Gainsborough and the English colourists, when he met a fellow
traveller in the person of Koppay ; while Ferraris has been schooled
in the elegance of Paris. Other prominent portrait-painters include
Viktor StaufFer (born in 1853), Canon, Hans Temple, Julius Schmid ;
xiv A
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
and among the quite young men but newly "arrived," John Quincey
Adams, Joannovits, Schattenstein, SchifF, and Victor Scharff (born in
1872), who while in Paris was a gifted pupil of Whistler, and since
then has painted a good deal in Volendam, Holland. Ludwig Koch
cultivates the sporting portrait, which he handles with vigour and
freshness.
In genre painting various men of talent are to the fore — artists of
the older school, like Franz Rumpler, that graceful eclectic, or the
more modernised Alois Delug, now a professor, and a striver after
greater things. Both of these men have found their own right
mood. Others are Eduard Veith (born in 1858), who has adopted
the English fairy tale style; Charles Wilda (born in 1854),
who has turned his back on the flesh-pots of Egypt to seek the cooler
joys of Lower Austria ; A. H. Schram (born in 1 864), a rather fanciful
colourist, who has, however, relapsed into excess of " sweetness,"
even in the agreeable work he did in Damascus last year ; Alphons
Mielich (born in 1863), a still more pronounced Orientalist, who,
with Professor Musil, discovered the anci*nf Arabian desert castles,
Amra and At-Juba, and copied their wall-paintings. Some have
gone abroad : to Paris, Eduard Charlemont (1848 — 1906), who
executed the ceilings — 54 metres long — in the foyer of the Burg-
Theater ; to Rome, Adolf Hiremy-Hirschl (born in 1860), who
became " modern," after having copied the style of Alma-
Tadema in his scenes of ancient life. In Albin Egger-Lienz (born
in 1868) we have what may be called a posthumous historian. He
has painted the story of the Tyrolese fight for freedom of 1809 in
pictures large and small, big events and little episodes, all conceived
in sombre and heroic spirit, but abounding in modern effects of
colour, and broadly and freely painted with the hand of to-day.
The great historical school of other days has died out, but a few
notable survivors remain : Sigmund L'Allemand and Julius von
Payer, the famous Arctic explorer and discoverer of Franz-Josefs
Land. The local Viennese genre picture in the style of the old
petit 's-maitres has more or less esteemed exponents in Anton Miiller,
Kinzel, Hessl, Baron Merode, Zewy, Gisela, and others. Isidor
Kaufmann (born in 1853) cultivates the Jewish genre style with an
old-fashioned "ethnographische" particularity and a neat solidity
which recall the early Dutchmen. In landscape the long enervated
School of Lichtenfels is dying out. From the Schindler period there
remain several excellent artists, whose lyrical charm never fails to
find admirers. At the head of these stands Hugo Darnaut (born in
1851), while the others include Rudolf Ribarz, who lived for
A xv
MODERN PAINTING IN AUSTRIA
many years in France, and died recently ; Hugo Charlemont ;
Ludwig Hans Fischer, who travelled and painted in Egypt
and India; Benesch Knupfer (in Rome), who has watched the
naiads of the Latin Sea ; Eduard Zetsche, who has painted
graceful monographs of our ruined castles ; Robert Russ, who has
bathed in the sunshine of the South Tyrol ; and the old, but
rejuvenated August Schaffer (born in 1833), Director of the Imperial
Picture Gallery, who forms a link between the present and the past.
Modern in his landscapes and " Veduta " work is Karl Pippich (born
in 1862) and ultra-modern Heinrich Tomec (born in 1863), both
of whom are interested in rare aspects of light and colour. Then we
have Friedrich Beck, with his novel impressions of snow scenes ;
and, lastly, Rudolf Quittner.
Neither has the reproductive art of Vienna been idle these last few
years. The spirit of the new age no longer meets with opposition,
even the schools recognise the policy of " the open door." In the
albums of the meritorious "Gesellschaft fiir vervieltaltigende Kunst"
(Society of Reproductive Art) the modern style of graphic art fills
the chief place. As a teacher the first position is still held by
William Unger (born in 1837), the old master from the old
galleries. He gives free rein to his pupils. They etch — in colours,
too — quite in the modern spirit. A strongly independent and
versatile painter-etcher is Ludwig Michalek (born in 1859) 5 an^
effects even more powerful have been realised by Ferdinand Schmutzer
(born in 1870), a natural black-and-white artist of uncommon force,
who has turned out plates of I'ao metre and even 1*50 metre
high. The first of these represents a young horsewoman, the
second the Joachim quartet. Whistler, the Prophet of the little,
delicate plate, would have crossed himself at sight of such excesses.
The foremost portrait-etcher in Vienna to-day is Schmutzer. His
strength is shown in his large portraits of Rudolf Art, the painter,
and Paul Heyse, the poet, also in the smaller, but artistically richer,
portraits of Professor Gomperz and Joachim, the world-famous
violinist. The popularity of the eau forte is now so widespread that
there actually exists an etching club for ladies which has issued
several interesting albums. At the Kunstgewerbe-Schule, the
Myrbach School was, until the resigning of that artist, a training-
ground for all descriptions of the graphic arts — the poster and the
caricature included.
A xvi
GELHARi
A 10 PROF. ANGELI
PORTRAIT OF
SIR H. M. STANLEY
A 11 PRCF. THEODOR AXENTOWICZ
PASTEL STUDY FOR ,,A PROCESSION"
A 12 HUGO DARNAUT
, BIRCH TREES BY A CANAL'
A 13 LUDWIG FERDINAND GRAF
A GARDEN STUDY
JOWIO FERDINAND GRAF
A OARDt M |
C3
Q
Q
HI
DC
o
A 15 WALTER HAMPEL
» A QUIET CORNER"— TEMPERA PAINTING
A 16 LEOPOLD HOROVITZ
PORTRAIT OF H.I.M. FRANZ JOSEF I.. EMPEROR
OF AUSTRIA AND KING OF HUNGARY
A 17 LEOPOLD HOROVITZ
PORTRAITIOF
COUNTESS POTOCKA
z
o
I
CD
<
UJ
D
m
tc
LU
z
A 19 QU3TA-
,,THE BIG POPLAR" ISY
A 19 GUSTAV KLIMT.
,,THE BIG POPLAR" (BY PERMISSION OF THE MIETHKE GALLERY OF FINE ARTS, VIENNA).
A 20 GUSTAV KLIMT
PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG LADY (BY PERMISSION
OF THE MEITHKE FINE ARTS GALLERY, VIENNA)
J
5
X
<
o
z
h
f
o
<
2
ul
I
I-
z
o
cc
z
UJ
m
X
<
o
z
I-
z
I
h
<
o
A 23 EMILIE MEDIZPELIKAN
..A COPSE"
tMILIE MEDIZ-PELIKAN
A 24 PROF. HANS NOWACK
,,THE GLAZIER'S SHOP, HALL (TYROLV- WATER-COLOUR.
<
o
I
H
I
O
IT
D
I
9
UJ
I
h
1
A 27 ERNST STOHR
.MOONLIGHT'
r
I
o
H
<f>
I
<
A 29 RUDOLF VON AL'
,,THE PATRICIANS
A 29 RUDOLF VON ALT.
,THE PATRICIANS' CLUB, INNSBRUCK "-WATER-COLOUR.
A 30 RUDOLF JETTMAR
..SUNRISE"— FROM THE SERIES
OF ORIGINAL ETCHINGS « THE
TWELVE HOURS OF THE NIGHT"
<
o
Q
D
tr
O
z
I
O
z
O
s
A 32 LUDWIG MICHALEK
..BUILDING THE RAILWAY BRIDGE
OVER THE TSONZO, NEAR SALCANO"
-ORIGINAL ETCHING (BY PERMIS-
SION OF REDLICH & BERGER, VIENNA)
X
o
O ui
CO Q
-I O
A 34 OSWALD ROUX.
••CtNe-COUHJRED ETCHING (BY PERMISSION OF GILMOFER 4 RAN4CHBUHG, VIENNA.
z x
gfc
I
r?
A 34 OSWALD ROUX.
SNOW SCENE— COLOURED ETCHING (BY PERMISSION OF GILHOFER <t RANSCHBURG, VIENNA.)
A 35 EMIL ORLIK
..SUNDAY"— ORIGINAL ETCHING
A 36 FERDINAND SCHMUTZER
PORTRAIT OF JOSEF JOACHIM— ORIGINAL ETCHING
A 37 FERDINAND SCHMUTZER
..THE EQUESTRIAN"— ORIGINAL ETCHING
0.
N
O
UJ
S
u
MODERN PLASTIC WORK
IN AUSTRIA. BY HUGO '.
HABERFELD. •
i HE art work of nations is divided into two
varieties : the " Kultisch " — or traditional —
and the individual. Greek plastic work was
for a long period traditional, the entire
people, and not the few only, producing it.
Artistic methods were as uniform as was the
general view of life and the conventions of art
were accepted just as unhesitatingly as was
the inherited idea of the Deity. Art was
a public matter, like religion and politics, and all personality was
put aside. There was seldom any individuality in the workshop ;
there existed no artistic proletariat, because each force organically
found its proper employment. So long as everything is surrounded
by a single symmetrical idea, as in the case of Greek art up to
the time of Praxiteles, or as in the Gothic art of Christianity, so
long does traditional art predominate. Let this idea be shattered,
however, and it vanishes, or else joins in alliance with the most
heterogeneous abstractions, creating the most heterogeneous forma-
tions. Then begins individuality in art. And that individuality
has now endured since the Renaissance. Just as one's outlook on
life has expanded, so have the means of expression increased and
multiplied. The individual creator stands in the forefront ; his
special characteristics, shared by none else, form his chief claim to
recognition. The artist has withdrawn himself from the protection
of the society around him, has lightly embarked on his calling with
all its possibilities of happiness or tragedy ; and beside him walks
Mecasnas, the patron.
It is but natural that in both epochs the arts should have developed
diversely. The Grecian temples and the Gothic cathedrals were
the colossal outcome of those national forces and aspirations which
in wonderful, mysterious order expressed themselves in the might
of their architecture, in the pathos of plastic art, and in the
loveliness of colour. The kinship of the arts was never sundered ;
from architecture sprang sculpture and painting, with new themes
and new blossoms. Since the days of the Renaissance it has been
otherwise. The monumental fresco has been superseded by the little
B i
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
easel-picture, and painting brought into its most fertile field of work.
Yet standing alone there came into being a world of inexpressible
beauty, which strove to attain a grace of subject and of method
never reached in fresco painting. The severance of sculpture from
architecture was most pernicious. Unlike painting, sculpture did
not follow the new laws imposed by its separate existence, and
thereby it escaped the great stream or development. Something
alien, something cold, made itself apparent in most sculpture, and
the quality of the work steadily depreciated.
While throughout Europe during the nineteenth century the
opportunities for a revival of plastic art were altogether unfavourable,
things were no better in Vienna. Our greatest sculptor of bygone
days, the highly-gifted Georg Rafael Donner (1693 — 1741), came
from a school of sculpture imbued with high traditions, yet he had
no worthy successors ; and thus the glorious period of the Viennese
baroque style reached in him at once its highest development and its
end. The sculptors of the first half of the nineteenth century were
either bound fast to the stiff forms of academic classicism, or had
lost themselves in trivial genre work of the " Empire-biscuit " type,
which had no connection with sculpture, but was rather an offshoot
of the truly delightful Old Viennese porcelain work. About the
middle of the century there came with Anton Fernkorn ( 1 8 1 3 — 1 878)
a strong infusion of the North German influence into Viennese plastic
work, and this was further emphasised later by Caspar v. Zumbusch,
who was born in 1830. The works of these two sculptors are
marked by the same strongly-developed influence of the bronze-cast
technique, and by a certain monumental effort, produced not so
much by heroic conception or form as by the colossal disposal or
their material, which ever seems to dominate its surroundings.
Beside these " immigrants " there arose a group of Viennese
sculptors. These were few in number ; indeed it has been estimated
that of two hundred Austrian artists who took part in the Paris
Exhibition of 1867 only two were sculptors. Interest in sculpture
was at that time very slight in Vienna, and it was left for artists of
a later date, artists more fully qualified, to increase that interest. In
this remark I of course except Karl Kundmann (born in 1838),
Rudolf Weyr (born in 1847), an<^ particularly Victor Tilgner
(1844 — 1896), so thoroughly Viennese, and full of talent.
The public, who, since the colour-craze of the Makart period,
had developed a fashion for visiting art exhibitions and studios,
still regarded plastic work with a lukewarm attention ; and even
to-day, when painting and applied art are of world-wide importance,
B ii
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
sculpture is still more or less neglected, and does not occupy by
any means its proper place. But meanwhile appreciation of this
most noble of arts is growing with increased knowledge, and
perhaps the twentieth century may be spoken of some day as " the
Sculptors' " century, just as the nineteenth is styled " the Painters'."
The most recent revolution in Viennese art, which came about with
the foundation of the "Secession" in the spring of 1897, had a less
favourable effect on sculpture than on painting. The young
generation of painters and applied art workers had produced many
brilliant works, whereas only a few isolated successes had been scored
in sculpture ; and, apart from that, the painters had a great advantage
Throughout the nineteenth century there had been a regular,
historically-evolved succession of Austrian painters, the list beginning
with Ferdinand Georg Waldmuller, and including Theodora v.
Hermann as a representative of the modern spirit. To such as
these our young artists could always turn for inspiration when in
danger of being too much diverted by foreign models and influences.
In the domain of plastic work the only tradition of this sort is that
of the Viennese medal. Its real founder was Josef Daniel Bohm
(1794 — 1 865), a delicate " Romantiker," who was inspired by antique
and religious art. A pupil of his was the somewhat prosaic Karl
Radnitzky (1818 — 1903), who in turn became the master of
Joseph Tautenhayn (born in 1837), an artist of great fertility of com-
position, and of the talented student of character, Anton ScharfF
(1845 — 1903)- It is interesting to note that ScharfF was
commissioned by the City of London to execute a medal of Queen
Victoria. There proceeded from the School of Tautenhayn, who
was a professor at the Academy, and from the School of ScharfF,
who was director of the Engraving School of the Mint, a number
of talented medallists : Rudolf Marschall (born in 1873), chiefly
known by his plaquettes and his medals of Kaiser Franz Josef I. and
Pope Leo XIII. ; then Franz X. Pawlik (born in 1865), Joser
Tautenhayn, Junr. (1868), Peter Breithut (1869), and Ludwig
Hujer (1870).
Austrian plastic work on a large scale, however, boasts no fruitful
tradition, such as painting and medalling possess. Every prominent
sculptor with us has always been an individual apart, an excep-
tion. We have never had a school whereby or wherefrom a
number of artists guided towards a common ideal might be
produced. The evil result of this has been that all our young
sculptors alike have had to rely solely upon themselves. It had,
however, this advantage, that there was no such embittered struggle
B iii
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
among the sculptors as with the painters ; moreover, certain artists
of the older generation being, as it were, isolated and absolutely
independent, found themselves able to join in the new movement.
Among those of our sculptors to-day who may be described as being
in the full bloom of their knowledge, is Edmund Hellmer (born in
1850), whose artistic character reveals a remarkable inconsistency.
On the one hand, Hellmer possesses the delicate grace and the
light-heartedness of the Viennese spirit ; on the other, we see
a sour hypercritic, never satisfied with what he has done, who,
to make his work still better, regards it ever from a more
minute, a more captious standpoint. Thus he is a most elaborate
finisher, never knowing when to leave his work alone, but
pottering over needless emendations until nearly all the charm
and spontaneity have been lost. How he began may be seen
in the monumental group on the roof of the Parliament House,
representing Kaiser Franz Josef I. granting the Constitution.
Here the academic spirit is mingled with a want of self-
dependence, which shows itself in too close a suggestion of certain
antique compositions of the same style, the result being that the
work has a rather stiff appearance. In the same way his second
big work, the Turkish memorial erected in 1883 in St. Stephen's
Cathedral, although it reveals more freedom of treatment, yet it
makes no " monumental " impression on the beholder, and con-
nects its creator with the group of men who follow in the
train of Count Starhemberg, the artistic Liberator of Vienna. So,
too, his later composition, Oesterreichs Landmacht, which stands
in a niche in the castellated fa9ade, is not very satisfying, for
while it is, in point of positive skill, far above the pendant
group Oesterreichs Seemacht by Weyr, it is greatly inferior thereto
in temperament and vivacity. Finally, his last monumental work,
the Castalia-Brunnen, for the courtyard of the University, is
excellent plastically, but its rather unfortunate architecture weakens
the effect. By the nature of his gifts Hellmer is most " at home "
with the single-figure memorial, wherein he contrives to put all that
is best in him. Here we have a memorial of the landscapist, Emil
Jakob Schindler, depicted in tourist costume, reposing on a rock ;
and then the Goethe monument in the Ringstrasse, where, not
only as a great poet, but as a great man, the figure is seen seated
in a fauteuil ; and, lastly, the graceful statue of the immortal
Empress Elisabeth at Salzburg, and a tombstone relief for the
grave of Hugo Wolf. It should be mentioned that Hellmer
is a professor at the Academy, and a famous teacher. From
B iv
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
his school came Therese Feodorowna Rics, and at the most recent
exhibitions there came into prominence such talented and highly
promising pupils as Hugo Kuhnelt, Anton Hanak, Franz Ehren-
hofer, and Alfred Hofmann.
The second artist of the older generation to fall in with the modern
spirit and to meet with a right hearty welcome was Arthur Strasser,
who was born in 1854. As a sculptor he belongs to a school which
in painting has won many triumphs — namely the Oriental ; and his
work forms, as it were, a plastic pendant to that of the late Leopold
Karl Miiller, the well-known painter of Eastern subjects, who died
in 1892. His best things are Japanese, Egyptian and Indian genre
paintings, in which he displays remarkable skill in depicting racial
characteristics and animal nature, combined with a strong sense of
colour. It is easy to understand that he revelled in Makart. When
Strasser joined the " Secession " his knowledge increased, and whereas
formerly he had been chiefly occupied with small bits of sculpture,
he soon began to devote himself to life-size^monumental groups, such
as his Mark Antony, who rides in triumph in a car drawn by lions, or
his Amazon Queen Myrina, who in grotesque embonpoint sits on a throne
of stone, holding two tigers chained, and with knitted brow looks
darkly down. For some time past Strasser has been a professor at
the " Kunstgewerbe-Schule " (School of Applied Art), and one rarely
sees any work by him nowadays.
The rest of the older men among our sculptors have not fallen in
with the new movement ; but for the most part have remained
attached to the old association, the " Kiinstlergenossenschaft."
None of them approach Hellmer or Strasser in importance, yet
some there are who deserve to be mentioned.
Hans Scherpe (born in 1855) is a popular memorial sculptor,
whose Anzengruber is much admired by the uncritical portion of
Vienna. The poet is represented as pausing during a walk on a
cliff, at the foot of which stands the Steinklopferhans, Anzengruber's
finest character, breaking stones. Hans Bitterlich (born in 1860),
a skilful craftsman, is now completing the figure in the memorial
to the Empress Elizabeth. The architectural portion of the work
was done by the " Oberbaurat," Ohmann. Last year Carl
Wollek completed a Mozartbrunnen, the group, Tamino and Pamina
being sympathetically treated in a flow of melodious lines. Josef
Kassin (born in 1856) came to the front with his group of a sick
girl and her nurse, commissioned by the Rothschild Hospital. By
Hans Rathausky (born in 1858) we have a good memorial of
Adalbert Stifter, the poet ; by Franz Seiffert, the figure portion of
B v
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
the Strauss - Lanner memorial, the highly effective architecture
of which was designed by Robert Orley ; and finally should be
mentioned the distinguished wood-carver, Franz Zelezny, and his
rival, Franz Earwig, whose works show all the severity proper to
the material employed.
As I have already said, plastic art played but a small part in
the events following the establishment of the " Secession " in
Vienna. And the meaning of my remarks will be easily under-
stood when it is realised how few sculptors are to be found
among the members of the two artists' associations. To the
" Secession " there still belong two sculptors. I am, of course, not
thinking here of Hellmer, already in high esteem, or of the highly-
gifted Hugo Lederer, who is essentially Austrian, although he
has lived for some years in Germany, where he has executed several
notable commissions, including the Bismarck memorial for Hamburg
and the University fountain at Breslau. The first of the two
sculptors just referred to is Alfonso Canciani (born in 1863), whose
design for a Dante memorial (the poet, standing on the edge of a
precipice, beholding the torments of the damned) attracted con-
siderable attention, although the composition as a whole is conceived
rather from the painter's than from the sculptor's standpoint. The
second of the two is Othmar Schimkowitz (born in 1860). He
worked for a long period in America with Karl Bitter, a native of
Vienna and a pupil of Hellmer's. Among the various works that
have brought his name into prominence are the Astor memorial
doors for Trinity Church, New York, and the equestrian statue of
Washington. On his return to Europe, Schimkowitz attracted
attention by his share in the Gutenberg memorial, in which he
collaborated with Plecnik, the architect ; but since then, with the
exception of an excellent memorial tomb, he has produced nothing
of similar merit. The " Hagenbund " boasts five sculptors among
its members. Mention has already been made of Barwig, the wood-
carver. Gustav Gurschner (born in 1873) shows great taste in his
small pieces, but he is somewhat inclined to mannerism, and
his applied art surroundings and connections cause his work to
smack rather too strongly of pure — and therefore not always of
novel — decorative effects. Joseph Heu and Theodor Stundl are two
young sculptors of all-round capacity and much promise, good both
in portraits and in figure compositions, but as yet undeveloped and just
at the start of their careers. The most original member of the little
group is, undoubtedly, Wilhelm Hejda (born in 1868), painter and
sculptor ; but as yet he has not fulfilled his promise of the savage
B vi
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
genius which marked the work of his early years — the savagery alone
has remained and that has overstepped the bounds of art and
of technique. As a colourist he is outre, yet he occasionally obtains
the happiest effects. So too his sculpture, which inclines towards
the horrible, is, as it were, bedaubed. Among the best of his most
unequal works is the coloured colossal relief "in yellow, green, gold and
glass cabochon on the fafade of the " Hagenbund." It represents
Pallas Athene protecting the Arts, while the people pay homage
to the goddess.
Of the artists who at present are attached to no association
must first be named Richard Luksch (born in 1872), who retired
from the " Secession " with the Klimt group. He combines a sure
mastery of form with great fancifulness of vision. Of this quality
there is a good example in his oak-carved Wanderer, a naked man,
of life size, striding over rough ground, whence, with each pace,
spring up on every side forms human and animal, symbolical of the
creatures and the ideals which he, in tke course of his life, has
ruthlessly trodden down. Luksch has recently produced much
good decorative plastic work for buildings of the Wagner and
Hoffmann style. His wife is the daughter of the Russian painter
Makowsky, Elena Luksch-Makowsky, an extraordinarily talented
artist both as painter and sculptor, not only showing genius in the
daring of her conceptions, but also creating from sheer love of the
beautiful. The only woman sculptor to be compared with her is
Elsa v. Kalmar. She commenced as a painter, but, turning later to
her more decided gift of sculpture, studied in Munich, and then for
two years in Florence, in order to learn of the old masters. Mention
should also be made of Joseph Milliner, who is still attempting
colossal figures, and who ought to develop into one of our most
refined plastic workers.
The Czechs have given to the world a number of sculptors. Even
before the modern movement there appeared a sculptor of note,
Joseph von Mylsbek (born in 1848), a plastic artist of truly monu-
mental greatness, imbued with historical feeling, not acquired, but
innate in his heroic nature. Although an Academy Professor in Prague
he has no direct following, since all the younger school treads a path
widely removed from his, with the exception of one, the eldest
amongst them, Stanislav Sucharda (born in 1866). Beginning as
Mylsbek's pupil, Sucharda continued to work for some considerable
time in his manner, only later turning his mind to that form of
plastic art which is to be found in the still unfinished Palacky
monument. His portraits of children are especially remarkable.
B vii
MODERN PLASTIC WORK IN AUSTRIA
Possessing a similar style, Frantisek Bilek (born in 1872), displays
something of the primitive but expressive Gothic manner, some-
thing of the painfully realistic naturalism of those most religious
artists. A truer exponent of sheer form is Ladislav Saloun, who
does portrait figures of ladies in full dress in the style of Carabin
or Troubetzkoi, and gives us a powerful example of his art in
the Huss monument. Joseph Maratka, who worked for many
years under Rodin, has produced exquisite female busts and statues.
And there is also Bohumil Kafka, who has already done good
work in portraiture, and shows still greater promise.
We now have to render homage to a sculptor who belongs to
none of the afore-named categories. The art of Franz Metzner
is chiefly characterised by the fact that he strives to prove that
the historical development of plastic art, as I have sought to
demonstrate in the opening of this article, has its issues in its
close alliance with architecture. What he desires is a blending
of architecture and plastic art, in which the plastic work should
appear as a flower sprung from the architectural soil. By
architecture Metzner does not understand a mere building for
practical uses, nor even a purely ornamental construction. He
would have mighty temples, halls, mausoleums, the stately art of
pure form, the harmony of great lines, free from petty detail, the
beauty of stone heaped upon stone. Such is also his plastic work ;
not a copy, but a symbolic representation of life and nature, a
simplification of form rather than a striving after variety of character-
istics and expression. And in the same degree as his architecture
and sculptures are of heroic proportions, so is the spiritual side of his
work a search after the great forces which govern our existence
and rule our lives.
Metzner has designed a memorial statue of Richard Wagner in
Berlin and a model for the Empress Elizabeth memorial. He
also created a design for a Nibelung fountain which was to have
been erected in front of the Vienna Votiv-Kirche. He is working
at present on a monument of Stelzhamer for Linz, the capital of
Upper Austria, a fountain for Reichenberg, an Emperor Joseph
memorial for Teplitz, and a Mozart memorial for Prague.
Metzner accepted with pride the commission of Bruno Schmitz,
the gifted creator of the " Volkerschlacht" memorial in Leipzig,
for the entire decoration of this monument. Austrian sculpture is
thus honoured in this young master, and he is undoubtedly its
greatest hope to-day.
B Vlll
LU >.
5 co
Z UJ
O cc
< I
-I O
.
si
H 2
§
cc
<
I
o
5
0)
UJ
oe
Q
o
o
D
n
<
B 3 & 4 RICHARD LUKSCH
RELIEFS ON THE FACADE OF THE
SANATORIUM AT PURKERSDORF
B 5 JOSEF ENGEUHART
FIGURE FOR A TOMB
STONE— BRONZE
B 6 CARL WOLLEK
TAMINO AND RAM INA "—PORTION OF
THE MOZART FOUNTAIN AT VIENNA
B 7 HUGO KUHNELT
DESPAIR "-MARBLE
B 8 FRANTISEK BILEK
MOSES
B 9 ANTON HANAK
PORTRAIT STUDY
B 10 PROF. EDMUND HELLMER
STUDY FOR THE GOETHE
MONUMENT IN VIENNA
B 11 ALFONSO CANCIANI
DANTE
N
1
z
<
o:
O
O
Z
N
Z
o
cc
m
I
z
<
z
B 13 ALFONSO CANCIANI
DANTE
O
0
<
a 3
O z
I
D.
I
O
I
z
I
cc
1
>
£
D
O
« 2
z &
0%
S a
IT
LU
Z
O
•
a
I- N
ttl Z
z "
O S
M
a 5
B 18 PROF. EDMUND HELLMER
HYGEIA
O
~> 0
N 2
Z <
<
X
O
THE ARCHITECTURAL
REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
BY HUGO HABERFELD .
the fact that it has taken its rise from the
domain of architecture lies the strongest proof
of the organic character of the modern art
movement in Austria. For whenever a new
style makes its appearance, it is in architecture
that its first indications are to be seen. During
the unrest of transition architecture affirms
most emphatically that she is the Urmufter,
the proto-parent of all the creative arts which
have originated from her as their common source. Architecture
is the first among them to accommodate "herself to the new spirit,
and her conquests and reverses determine the fate of painting and
sculpture. For this reason modern Austrian art also began with
architecture.
In October, 1895, ere yet there was the slightest thought about
" Secession " among us, when our modern painters and sculptors
were either to be found among that reactionary group, the old
" Kiinstlergenossenschaft," or pursued their studies abroad, a book
made its appearance bearing the title of " Modern Architecture."
Its author, Oberbaurat Otto Wagner, who had only the year before
been appointed professor at the Vienna Academy, herein formulated,
for the benefit of his pupils, his views on the nature and aims of
architecture. The book has since run through many editions, but,
when it first appeared, it was greeted by Wagner's colleagues with
open hostility or even scorn. The rising generation of architects,
however, rallied to his cry, and welcomed the bold innovator.
Born in Vienna on the I3th July, 1841, Wagner attended first the
gymnasium at Kremsmiinster ; then the Vienna Polytechnic, whence
he migrated to Berlin, to study at the Bau-Akademie. Ultimately
he returned to Vienna and became a pupil of August Siccardsburg at
the Academy — an architect whose merits, like those of his friend
Van der Null, are nowadays much underestimated. He had a
marked influence on young Wagner, who found in him a kinship of
ideas and sentiments not only in relation to art but in regard to
matters in general. Siccardsburg stood foremost among the older
generation of Viennese architects in recognising and advocating the
c i
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
importance of constructive principles ; and being, moreover, a man
of the world, with a wide knowledge of its ways, this side of his
character sympathetically reacted on Wagner's persevering and
practical nature. Then, just at the time when Wagner began to
work on his own account, Vienna entered upon that brilliant epoch in
which are associated with the first expansion of the city the names
of Ferstel, Hansen, Schmidt and Hasenauer, who created that great
thoroughfare, the Ringstrasse, famous for its monumental structures.
It occupies the site of the glacis which had encircled the old city
with a girdle of green. That was in the third quarter of the past
century, a period when in German art and science the historic view
prevailed — that view against whose pernicious domination young
Friedrich Nietzsche launched the second of his " Unzeitgemasse
Betrachtungen."
The architects just mentioned were artists of large ideas, but them-
selves imposed limitations on their capabilities, in the belief that
only in one or other of the historic styles could they give expression
to their architectural aims. They enjoyed a great reputation in
Vienna, and settled for years to come the direction of architectural
activity there. But while their surpassing talent enabled them to
thoroughly master the ancient styles without sacrificing their
independence, their pupils and imitators, on the other hand, became
hopelessly enslaved to these styles. With them all that an architect
need do was to copy, with more or less skill but without a particle
of " geist," the examples given in the text-books. One needed to
see with one's own eyes the low ebb to which architectural under-
standing and taste had fallen to realise the pressing need of a change
like that which Wagner inaugurated.
Wagner's great merit— one may say the greatest — is to have instilled
into architecture a new life ; it is through him that it has ceased to
have that petrified rigidity, that weary pedantic character it once
had. " Art exists for mankind, not mankind for art," he once
wrote ; and thus he regards architecture as a living force fulfilling
individual needs and aspirations, and at the same time a monumental
document of social life. But while thus regarding architecture as
the highest expression of human knowledge ever striving to attain
the divine — the highest because nature provides her with no model
for guidance — he requires of her that, like an attentive handmaiden,
she shall be subservient to all the requirements of modern life, and it
is the highest gift an architect can possess to perceive these needs as
they arise. Once the end to be aimed at is clearly recognised, the
question of appropriate materials calls for solution. From these two
c ii
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
factors — purpose and material — there ensues what we call form or
style. Hence there is no such thing as a style which is universally
appropriate and applicable. Style being a product of these two ever-
varying factors, its determination must depend on concomitant
circumstances such as locality, climate and so forth ; while all new
methods and inventions which may serve to enhance comfort have
to be taken into account.
Previous to his appointment as professor at the Academy, Wagner
had erected a large number of buildings — some public, like the
Landerbank and Dianabad, but principally private houses and flats ;
and he even built on a large scale at his own risk. In 1894, the year
of his appointment, he commenced his first great municipal under-
taking— the construction of the Metropolitan railway in Vienna.
When he came on the scene another architect was already in the field
with plans for this railway, and the eventual adoption of Wagner's
scheme seemed to denote the victory of the new spirit over the old.
Wagner steadily followed his new principles, first of all in his plans,
and afterwards in construction — tentatively at first, but with more
and more freedom during the progress of the undertaking — always
keeping in view the end to be subserved — namely, rapid, safe,
and comfortable travelling, and adapting the form and decoration
of the various structures in harmony with their purpose and the
material employed. In the Gumpendorfer Bridge, a huge
structure which carries the railway high above the streets, the
decoration is meagre, consisting only of vertical rows of wreaths,
discs, and festoons, Wagner's favourite motifs. The pavilion at
Hietzing, used as a private station by the Imperial Court, although
quite a plain building, is as pleasant and graceful in appearance as
any little rococo temple. Besides the two factors — purpose and
material — there is another which is taken account of by Wagner as
affecting form and decoration, that of environment. Thus the
proximity of Karlskirche determined the diminutive size and ornate
character of the station buildings on Karlsplatz, and the covered-in
precincts of the station on Franz-Josef-Quai, the gallery-like con-
struction looking towards the Danube Canal. On this one achieve-
ment, then, there was brought to bear a wealth of experience and
inventiveness, and even engineering knowledge, such as is rarely to
be met with among architects.
Since then not a year has passed without some extensive undertaking
being planned and thought out down to the smallest detail by
Wagner, regardless of whether it would be executed or not. The
year 1898 brought his truly original plans for an Academy of Fine
c iii
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
Arts, for Theophil Hanscn's luxurious structure on the Schillerplatz
no longer sufficed to meet modern requirements and views. While
this covers a superficial area of 5,429 square metres, Wagner
requires for his plan 122,500 square metres, and on that account
has placed it in the outskirts of the city. A wonderfully co-ordi-
nated architectural group forms the foreground of his clever project.
The central building, surmounted by a lofty dome, and destined to
serve as a great hall or Ehrenhalle for ceremonial occasions, is to be
of granite, with metal decoration partly of beaten copper and partly
of gilded bronze, the latter more particularly for the circle of wreath-
bearing figures — symbolizing Victory — above the dome. From
this central building leafy walks lead off right and left to the side
buildings, longitudinal structures in which the galleries are to be
located. The problem of lighting is solved in the most natural and
practical way, the side aisles obtaining their light laterally, the
centre aisle from above. In the rear are situated the pavilions to be
devoted to instruction and work, planned with most lavish regard
for the requirements of modern art teaching. A model of the entire
scheme was shown at the second exhibition of the " Secession," but
the project has not been carried out ; nor have Wagner's plans
for the reconstruction of the Capucine Church, containing the
crypt of the Imperial House of Habsburg, nor his first plans
for a modern church, though with regard to this latter he has
utilised the experience and results derived from it in a church
he is actually carrying out. But the most interesting among
those of his projects which have not been carried into execution
is that for the Vienna City Museum, which has culminated in
a conflict of opinion more passionate than any which has raged
about a building in Vienna for many long years. The matter
is at present in abeyance, but a genuine appreciation of the
pre-eminent qualities of Wagner's scheme appears to be spreading,
and we may yet hope to see the museum standing alongside the
Karls church in surroundings worthy of it, for the modern structure
of glass and iron aptly expresses its practical purpose, just as Fischer
von Erlach's baroque fabric suggests the ritual religiousness of his time.
Of undertakings which have not simply remained on paper two or
three of recent date call for particular mention. In the first place
there are the Miethauser, or flats, in the Friedrichstrasse, which
Wagner erected in the summer of 1899, and of which the two
fronting on the street may be regarded as models of the modern type
of Viennese houses of that class, just as, at an earlier date, Hansen's
Heinrichshof represented the older type of houses in the Ringstrasse.
c iv
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
Another building now approaching completion is the church for the
Lower Austrian Lunatic Asylum in Breitensee, an outlying suburb
of Vienna. The church forms a quadrangle surmounted by a
dome which, with its overlay of red copper plates, is visible
from a great distance. The fa9ade consists of a columnar
portico with roof, and is surmounted by two towers bearing
statues of the patron saints of the country. The lunette above the
portico contains a pictorial mosaic by Professor Koloman Moser,
to whom is also due an altar-piece representing " Paradise." The
interior is a model of precisely calculated adaptation to requirements.
As an instance of Wagner's thoughtfulness in regard to details, it
may be mentioned that when designing the confessional boxes,
(which are usually turned out in factories after a stereotyped pattern),
he took into account a possible hardness of hearing on the part of
the priest. Then finally we have the Post Office Savings Bank
building, another masterly creation. As regards its style, Wagner's
object was to give the structure a modcrfe character appropriate to
its purpose as public offices. It is a brick building, the lower
portion of the exterior being faced with granite, and the above with
slabs of Laas marble and stoneware, while the roof is of slate.
Inside, the predominant feature is the quadrangular central hall, with
a superficial area of more than five hundred square metres and
divided into three aisles by two rows of pillars. In a short time
the building will be finished, but with untiring energy Wagner
is already hard at work on new projects, one of them a great
bridge over the Danube Canal, while another is among the greatest
he has yet essayed — the plans for the Palace of Peace at the
Hague, which he has been invited to submit in competition.
Before going on to speak of Wagner's pupils and continuators, we
must mention three among the most notable of a large number of
architects who stand apart from him, or in opposition to him.
First there is Oberbaurat Friedrich Ohmann, the chief among them.
He is, like Wagner, a professor at the Vienna Academy, and is an
adherent of the school founded by Friedrich Schmidt and continued
by Von Luntz. In 1899 he was entrusted with the supervision of
the construction of the new Imperial Hofburg, already commenced
by Hasenauer. Ohmann was born in 1858, and after studying at
the Vienna Polytechnic under Karl Konig, an able but now
decidedly underestimated man, became a pupil of Friedrich Schmidt
at the Academy. Though receiving his most decisive impressions
from the historic school, his position towards it has never been
that of a mere imitator, but always that of one who derives aesthetic
c v
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
enjoyment, whose artistic individuality and creative power are not
strong enough to conceal in his work the influence of the beauty of
the past. The baroque style more especially has found in Ohmann
a superlative draughtsman ; it was in Prague that he made close
acquaintance with it, while professor at the School of Applied Art.
At that time, too, he erected a number of houses in Prague, restored
churches and castles in various parts of Bohemia, and worked out
the plans for the museums in Reichenberg and Magdeburg — all of
them excellent achievements, though here and there wearing a
hybrid aspect through the conjunction of both historic and modern
styles. At Vienna, whither he was called from Prague, he has
approximated more closely to modern views, as is shown by works
carried out by him there, both public and private. But his talent
has not yet reached its fullest development, and one may expect
from him yet finer achievements than hitherto.
Another man who at first favoured the historic school is Max
Fabiani, a professor at the Vienna Polytechnic ; but he has, obviously
under the influence of modern ideals, attained by degrees to a freer
conception, which has so far been most sympathetically manifested
in two business houses. The last of this trio of architects is Franz,
Freiherr von Krauss, who has diligently experimented in many
directions, always with aptitude but without any pronounced
originality. His greatest successes so far have been the two theatres
in Vienna — the Jubilaumstheater and the Biirgertheater.
Otto Wagner has trained quite a number of architects, some of
whom have already become celebrated. At their head is Professor
J. M. Olbrich, who left Hasenauer and went to Wagner. Olbrich
is a man highly gifted, impulsive and imaginative, a poetic inter-
preter of space, and a decorator of rare taste. Through Wagner he
acquired self-restraint and a severely critical attitude towards him-
self and art. Still Olbrich retained so great a fund of enthusiasm
that he became the leader of the younger generation of architects.
His Vienna buildings, true documents of the " Ver Sacrum,"
have all of them provoked the fiercest conflict of opinion. His
first effort was the " Secession " building, erected during the
space of a few months, a work vigorous and fresh in conception,
sober yet impressive, well-proportioned and graceful, and withal
a personal creation yet dictated by " purpose." The particular
problems presented by an exhibition building have never been
better solved ; the interior has been so planned that instead of
being fixed the walls are movable, so that any desired portion of
the space may be available with top light or side light. Olbrich,
c vi
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
too, was the first to plan country houses of a modern type in the
outskirts of Vienna — and he designed the first monument of a
modern character in a Vienna cemetery. He would doubtless
have been a pioneer amongst us in many other directions had not
the Grand Duke of Hesse summoned him to Darmstadt in 1899.
We can see from his book " Ideas " how much Austrian art has
lost by Olbrich's migration to Germany.
The next and, after Olbrich, perhaps the most important of Wagner's
pupils is Professor Josef Hoffmann. He was born in 1870, at a little
Moravian town, and in 1897 joined the Vienna "Secession," for
whom, in the following years, he designed and arranged some very
fine exhibition interiors. In 1899 he became professor at the School
of Applied Art, and in 1903 founded, in conjunction with Professor
Koloman Moser and aided by a wealthy and generous patron of
art, the organisation known as the " Wiener Werkstaette," to which
he devoted his whole attention on his retirement from the
" Secession." Hoffmann began as they atl began — he allowed his
imagination full play. In this way there came into existence on
paper the most colossal edifices, among them the vast scheme
for a Palace of Peace, a gigantic combination of temples,
piers, gardens, fountains, etc. Then, when Hoffmann received his
first real commission, it became clear that along with his
imaginativeness he possessed, in perhaps a still greater measure,
the constructive sense. In 1900 he began the construction of his
villa colony on the " Hohe Warte," a plateau charmingly located in
the midst of a hilly country, typically Viennese in character, and
the group of dwellings he has erected there blend happily, both in
the aggregate and individually, with their surroundings. The houses
are situated in the midst of gardens which have been planned as
architectural adjuncts, not in gardener fashion, and are all alike in so
far that they all bear the conspicuous impress of their designer,
though each is different from the rest. The windows are not placed
according to any apparent symmetrical system, but seem to have
been put here and there just at those places where the architect
thought they were required. The interiors are of a simple, homely
character, pleasantly and conveniently arranged. In Austria Hoff-
mann has, up to the present, been most successful in planning private
residential houses as far as possible in harmony with the character of
the inmates, and in which full regard is paid to comfort. At the
same time he has successfully undertaken houses destined to accom-
modate a larger concourse of people ; for example, a workmen's hotel
at Kladno, dating from 1902, and the Sanatorium in Purkersdorf,
c vii
THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIVAL IN AUSTRIA
near Vienna, finished last year, in which all the complex needs of a
hydro have been provided for in the most simple, ingenious and
agreeable manner.
Quite lately Josef Plecnik, by birth a Slovene, has come so much
to the front that we feel justified in giving him the third place.
Art-lovers early recognised and appreciated his talent, perceiving
throughout his work a remarkable sincerity of feeling savouring
almost of early Christian times. From his religious fervour, charac-
teristic of the Southern Slavs in general, they anticipated that he would
some day attract the notice of the world by some achievement in the
domain of modern ecclesiastical architecture, and if he has not
already fulfilled these expectations it is not his fault, but simply
because no commission has been forthcoming.
Among Wagner's pupils of this generation there remains to be
mentioned Leopold Bauer. Quite early in his career as an architect,
and when he had hardly left the Academy, he published a book,
" Verschiedene Skizzen, Entwurfe, und Studien" ("Sundry Sketches,
Designs and Studies"), which showed him to be the most radical
and consistent among his brother architects. Six years have passed
since then, and Bauer's views have undergone a marked change.
Not that he has in any point diverged from modern principles, but
his attitude towards the architecture of the past is no longer one
of downright opposition. He has come to recognise that if archi-
tecture as an art is to be a vital force, it cannot wholly neglect
tradition. He would step in where the organic evolution of
Viennese architecture was suddenly interrupted at the beginning of
the nineteenth century, the period of the Biedermaier style. Then
we must just refer to Jan Kotera, who was one of the founders of the
" Manes " Artists' League, and is a leading organiser in the art-world
of the Czechs. His erections are principally country houses, and
he successfully and happily combines in them constructive principles
with the traditional Slavic mode of building. Finally the brothers
Hubert and Franz Gessner deserve honourable mention for their
Artisans' Home in Vienna and the District Offices of the Kranken-
kasse (Sick Club) at Floridsdorf— both of them structures admirably
fitted for their functions, and permeated by a genuine feeling for
social welfare. As to the younger disciples of Wagner their number
is legion, and we must refer readers to the annual publications,
of the " Wagner-Schule." In these confirmation will be found for
the assertion that contemporary architecture in Austria can challenge
comparison with that of other countries,
c viii
C I & 2 LEOPOLD BAUER
IHIIHIIHI
KITCHEN AND CHILDREN'S ROOM
C 3 LEOPOLD BAUER
BATHROOM EXECUTED
BY R. MASINI VIENNA
C 4 DUSAN JURKOVIC
COUNTRY HOUSE
C 5 WUNIBALD DEININGER
COUNTRY HOUSE IN GUT'
ENSTEIN, LOWER AUSTRIA
o
z
z
uj
O
UL
O
IT
0.
(O
O
h cc
3 (-
O «>
3
Z <
tr
< UJ
C 7 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
iliifi
•mm
COVERED PAVILION IN THE SANATORIUM AT PURKERS-
DORF. EXECUTED BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY
PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
5 ui > <E
T I "" <E
- h u
c r I
O tt
r* >- uj
H m , u.
2 Co
<Q <
O) U ^ z
u. X
O UJ
• i —
i ">
>
m
—
uj ^ •
5|l
P. I
z
z
.
O
O
cc
a
a
•8
Mi.^.- .-.•.•.•.-.•.•.• .- ..-.- .-.-.• .-.•.•.•.-.•.•.•.•.::
/ \\^ II ••
H uj z
< T. O
>=
5 m S
o a
HOS:
£xt 9
h w LJ
u. < h
O H <
i/ <n cc
U
C 11 & 12 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
HIM"
•••Ml
KITCHEN AND BEDROOM EXECUTED BY W. MULLER
VIENNA. TEXTILES BY BACKHAUSEN & SONS VIENNA
C 13 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
COUNTRY HOUSE
z
z
O
I
o
tc
0.
D u.
uj O
31
O a
* >.
o ca
m h
O I-
^,
S a: T
< u 0
z 5 O
O
O
z
I
O
tfl
o
I
*
o
h
o
h £
z >
cc .
D Z
u- X
82
C 16 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
«gr
COUNTRY HOUSE
z
z
O
O
cc
CO
O
0 ? - s
Q 5 "
UJ ul < S
h DC z *
Oh- <
-
I- < u.
-
Q. (/) ^; O
"J ^ O u)
O a < U)
uj UJ _l -
ir £ to 5
z
z
.
O
O
-3
Ib
O
0
UJ UJ
oc t-
. .
O z"
r"
Q z 4
UJ Ul
CO CQ -i
C 19 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
KITCHEN
.
O
I
O
cc
4
O
C 22 & 23 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
BILLIARD ROOM EXECUTED BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
BEDROOM EXECUTED BY W. MdLLER, VIENNA
C 24 & 25 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
PIANO IN OAK STAINED BLACK EXECUTED BY BORSENDORFER, VIENNA
CARD TABLE AND CHAIRS EXECUTED BY THE WIENER
WERKSTAETTE (BY PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
C 26 BARON F. K
25 PflOF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
.
LO BY THE WIENEH
r*»« HOFRAT KOCH1
C 26 BARON F. KRAUSS.
DESIGN FOR A PARLOUR.
C 27 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
C 28 JAN KOTERA
VILLA IN VIENNA
VILLA IN BOHEMIA.
C 29 JAN KOTfeRA
PUBLIC OFFICES AT KRALOVE
HRADEC IN BOHEMIA
•C 30 JAN KOTERA
COUNTRY HOUSE
•C 31 STANISLAW WITKIEWICZ
COUNTRY HOUSE IN ZAKO
PANE STYLE, GALICIA
o
-J <
IT Z"
< z
LU UJ
OH
vfil
z
o
o
p
o
' * ' J1
I&
± UJ
X
C 34 PROF. KOLOMAN MOSER
BBBBB
* • •
« » » ' «
BEDROOM IN WHITE MAPLE
EXECUTED BY THE WIENER
WERKSTAETTE (BY PER-
MISSION OF HERR HOFRAT
KOCH)
" Ill-gill
1:0
£2
I:2
CO
o o
S UJ
O X
o o
C 37 HANS OFNER
•
ENTRANCE HALL EXECUTED BY
HEINTSCHEL & CO., ST. POLTEN
C 38 HANS OFNER
ENTRANCE HALL EXECUTED BY
HEINTSCHEL & CO., ST. POLTEN
D <
UJ Z
I- Z
3 HI
o ?
LiJ
X ffi
UJ UJ
O
Q Z
< >
I m
0
z
I
o
9
«
Q h
UJ U>
UJ U
X
UJ .3
I-
Z> I-
O 01
UJ .-
X O
UJ o
•8
5 -i
§U
X
(T O
U)
< 11
O I
C 42 PROF. OHMANTJ
THE HALL OF ANTIQUITIES AT MAGDEBURG (BY
PERMISSION OF ANTON SCHROLL & CO., VIENNA)
C 43 PROF. OLBRICH
GARDEN VILLA
I- Z
< O
UJ CO
1 1
m x
_u
x 22
X
o
O
•
E
o 5
b- 1-
C 45 PROF. OLBRICH
DINING ROOM IN THE HOUSE OF
THE CHAPLAIN-IN ORDINARY TO
THE GRAND DUKE OF HESSE
o
o
i-
m
O
tr
1 1 ^y
I-
D
O
C 47 ROBERT ORLEY
STUDY EXECUTED BY RICHARD LUDWIG, VIENNA
UI z
C UJ
Z >
~ S
Q 2
II
I Q.
O) O
> CO
>
Q CQ
<2
m o
< UJ
O UJ
h CQ
cr
O
m
O
C 50 OTTO FRUTSCHER
DINING ROOM EXECUTED
BY JOHANN SEIDL, VIENNA
C 51 OTTO PRUTSCHER
DESIGN FOR AN
ENTRANCE HALL
C 52 OTTO PRUTSCHER
SITTING ROOM. FURNITURE EXECUTED BY L. BER-
MANN, VIENNA. TEXTILES BY C. GIANI JUN., VIENNA
C 53 OTTO PRUTSCHE.R
BEDROOM IN EUMWOOD INLAID WITH
MAHOGANY AND EBONY EXECUTED
BY A. POSPISCHIL, VIENNA. CARPET
BY J BACKHAUSEN & SONS, VIENNA
C 54 OTTO PRUTSCHER
BEDROOM IN ELMWOOD INLAID WITH MAHOGANY
AND EBONY EXECUTED BY A. POSPISCHIL, VIENNA
MOSAIC EXECUTED BY REMYGIUS GEYLING VIENNA
C 55| "OTTO PRUTSCHER
BEDROOM IN ASH AND EBONY EXECUTED BY
CARL PROMMEL, VIENNA. CARPET BY J. BACK-
HAUSEN & SONS, VIENNA. LUSTRE BY
BAKALOWITS & SONS, VIENNA
C 56 JOSEF URBAN
WINTER GARDEN. FURNI-
TURE BY PRAG-RUDNIKER
KORBFABRICATION, VIENNA
C 57 JOSEF URBAN
DINING ROOM IN MAHOGANY
INLAID WITH MOTHER-OF PEARL
EXECUTED B^ HOLLMANN, VIENNA
C 58 JOSEF URBAN
LIBRARY IN MAHOGANY INLAID
WITH IVORY AND MOTHER-OF-
PEARL. OLD SILVER FITTINGS
BY S. JARAY, VIENNA. LUSTRES
BY BAKALOWITS & SONS, VIENNA
C 59 JOSEF URBAN
BOUDOIR WITH WALLS OF PURPLE SILK AND MAHOG-
ANY INLAID WITH MOTHER-OF-PEARL. EXECUTED
BY SANDOR JARAY, VIENNA
C 60 & 61 JOSEF URBAN
'
MUSIC ROOM IN NATURAL MAHOGANY. EXECUTED BY HOLLMANN, VIENNA
DINING ROOM. WALLS WHITE ENAMEL WITH PAINTED DESIGN. FURNITURE IN
BLACK MAPLE WITH SILVER FITTINGS. EXECUTED BY HOLLMANN, VIENNA
LUSTRE BY BAKALOWITS & SONS, VIENNA. CARPET BY GINSKY MAFFERSDORF
C 62 JOSEF URBAN
SITTING ROOM IN HUNGARIAN NATURAL OAK. WITH
GILDED FITTINGS AND WALL HANGINGS OF EMERALD
GREEN AND RED SILK. EXECUTED BY SANDOR JARAY
VIENNA. ELECTRIC PENDANT DESIGNED BY OTTO
PRUTSCHER, EXECUTED BY BAKALOWITS& SONS, VIENNA
C 63 JOSEF URBAN
SITTING ROOM IN HUNGARIAN NATURAL OAK WITH
GILCED FITTINGS AND WALL HANGINGS OF EMERALD
GREEN AND RED SILK. EXECUTED BY SANDOR JARAY, VIENNA
C 64 JOSEF URBAN
BOUDOIR. EXECUTED BY SANDOR JARAY, VIENNA FUR-
mTURE IN NATURAL MAHOGANY INLAID WITH.'MOTHER
OF-PEARL. LUSTRES BY BAKALOWITS & SONS, VIENNA
MODERN DECORATIVE
ART IN AUSTRIA '?;./; '.r ^§^|f } '
BY A. S. LEVETUS ^ ;
TRUE feeling for art and decoration is inborn
in the Austrians. Their national art is sufficient
proof of this. But the modern movement in
decorative art owes its inception to outside
influence — to England ; its development, how-
ever, comes from the Austrians themselves.
Even before Hofrat von Scala held that memor-
able exhibition at the Austrian Museum during
Christmas, 1897, where he showed nothing but
the best English furniture and household effects, Chippendale,
Sheraton, Heppelwhite, and others, the young Austrian artists
had long felt that nothing but an upheaval could bring their
art out of the slough into which it had fallen. They had become
mere copyists of old and senseless forms ; they were young, and
living in a progressive age they realised the necessity to express
that which they inwardly felt.
But there were other factors besides this exhibition which led to the
upheaval. Just about the same time a young architect, Adolf Loos,
a Viennese who had travelled much and lived in America and
England, returned to his native city, and through the medium
of the " Neue Freie Presse " expounded his views on men's
clothing, furnishing and decoration. The interest he aroused
helped to create a desire for better style, and in the shop
windows were displayed articles which were more or less
echt-englisch.
Naturally there was danger that the Austrians would again become
mere copyists, but of another style. Luckily all fear soon passed away.
Out of Professor Wagner's school of architecture a number of young
architects came, men of intelligence and capability, filled with a
burning desire to show what they could do. They were conscious
of their power, for, as in modern architecture so in modern decorative
art, Otto Wagner was the leader. He filled his students with
his enthusiasm, but he in no way sought to restrict them ; and
therein lies his greatness. Freedom of thought to all, based on a
firm scientific foundation, might well be his motto. And long before
there was any outward expression of the new movement in Austria
D i
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
" The Studio " was unostentatiously but surely doing its work there
as in other countries besides England. As Herr Muthasius said in
his lectures on the " English Home," given at the Austrian Museum
a few weeks ago, " The Studio " led the way to a new order of things
by resolutely showing only that which was best.
But a struggle followed, for it was not easy to change the order of
things. There were fears that the Austrian style (sic) would be lost.
The authorities forgot that the fine Biedermaier period had long
passed, giving way to commonplace imitations, which they were
only too anxious to preserve.
Finally, in the Spring of 1897, ^e "Secession" was founded. It
needed an upheaval to bring about a complete change, but even
at the first exhibition held by this society promise of a great future
was shown. The word " Secession " caught fire ; everything outre
bore the title " secessionistisch," and as in painting and architecture
there were true and false Klimts and Otto Wagners, so in the arts
and crafts there were true and false secessionists. But what a world
lay between the two ! The stranger coming to Vienna, who knew
nothing of Josef Hoffmann, Olbrich, Koloman Moser, Plecnik,
Leopold Bauer, Jan Kotera, Adolf Bohm, Roller, Krauss, and other
secessionists in the arts and crafts, must have shrunk from " Seces-
sion " with a feeling of horror that in a city famous for art such
" un-art " should be found, and longed for those bronzes, leather
goods, porcelain and other objets d'art for which this historic
city had long been celebrated. " Secession " has survived this, for it
is no longer a by-word, but one to which all honour is due. Even
the split has made little difference in this respect. The "Secession"
has done most to bring about the modern development in the arts
and crafts ; it showed what other nations were doing, and introduced,
among others, the Belgian, English, and Scotch schools to Vienna.
Oddly enough, the two latter appealed most to men like Hoffmann and
Moser, for while Van der Velde found footing in Germany, Ashbee
and the Mackintoshes were preferred in Austria, though Olbrich
followed in the footsteps of the Belgians. Out of these foreign
elements has arisen a true Austrian style, which has gradually but
surely developed during the last eight years.
The appointment in 1899 of Baron Felician Myrbach as Director
of the k.k. Kunstgewerbe-Schule (Imperial Arts and Crafts School)
was a step in the right direction, for he had travelled much, and
had lived and studied art in Paris. He was a man of large ideas,
conscious of the strength of his staff, which numbered many able
men — Josef Hoffmann, Alfred Roller, Koloman Moser, Arthur
D ii
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
Strasser, Rudolf, Edler von Larisch, and, later on, C. O. Czescka
— all young and earnest men, great both as artists and teachers.
Their appointment marked a new era in Austrian decorative
art. What this Kunstgewerbe-Schule has done for modern art
in Austria can already be seen, for every year it is sending forth
a number of new men eager to prove their ability. Some few
manufacturers have helped, and all honour is due to them, but here
again practically unsurmountable difficulties had to be contested.
Many of these manufacturers had been accustomed to get designs
for nothing ; silver had been sold per weight, with no additional
sum for the artistic design ; who could have thought that the
work of the artist would also have to be taken into account ?
Such things were practically unknown ; why should the old regime
be changed ? This struggle is still going on, and is likely so to do ;
the public are at fault, for they desire cheap things, and in the search
for cheapness the artist is too often forgotten.
But in spite of all this there is a general desire on the part of the
educated public to employ the architect for the furnishing and
arrangements of the home — though means do not always allow this.
There are several good men in Austria, men of many and varied
talents, who have produced good work and helped to stimulate
activity in art. Fortunately, too, there are capable workmen, for
in cabinet-making especially Austria is to the fore. The workmen
have a true love of work, and delight in the expression of the artist's
fancy, especially in fine intarsias, mosaics, and other inlaying.
The finish is admirable, and it is no wonder that such men easily
find employment in foreign countries.
But it is not always easy for artist and workman to keep in touch
with one another, and it was with a desire to span the bridge which
necessarily exists, where the artist makes designs for the manufacturer
and for various reasons is allowed no further interest in them, that the
Wiener Werkstaette was founded last year, with Professor J. Hoffmann
and Professor Koloman Moser as artistic directors. It is not given to
every man to see his ideals fulfilled, but these two professors are among
the fortunate few. They are both men of great versatility and capable
of achieving what they have set before them as their task. Hence
their success. Professor Hoffmann's great aim is to follow in the
footsteps of Ruskin and William Morris, to create a home of art in
Vienna, and so bring about a right feeling not only for the artist but
for the craftsman who breathes life into the artist's work. Some of
the young artists who are trained at the Kunstgewerbe-Schule are
employed by the Wiener Werkstaette ; the seeds have been sown
D iii
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
well, and, from an artistic point of view, great success has been
achieved. And that is what concerns us here.
Utility is the first condition, but there is no reason why the simplest
articles of household effects should not be beautiful. The value
does not lie only in the material, but in the right thought and
treatment of the material, and its power to convey that thought
to the minds of others, to convince them. This is no easy task.
What it is capable of producing the Wiener Werkstaette has already
shown. The new Sanatorium at Purkersdorf, near Vienna, which
was designed by Professor Hoffmann, is a convincing proof of whac
may be achieved by the united aid of artist and workman working
together in harmony for a common cause. With the exception of
the textiles — which, however, were designed by Professor Hoffmann
—and the kitchen utensils, everything was made by the Wiener
Werkstaette, including the building itself. The interior is very
refreshing, from the roomy hall, where Professor Moser's fine glass
window may be seen, to the living and bed-rooms above and the
kitchens below. Professor Hoffmann has a predilection for white
and black. What might appear monotonous by mere description
is not so in reality ; the lines are harmonious and restful, and the
distribution of light everywhere is admirable, for the professor is
too great an artist not to be mindful of every detail. There are
billiard, card, reading, and music rooms, and salons for ladies and for
gentlemen, as also a joint drawing-room. There are also bath-rooms
for every possible treatment, for a sanatorium has something of the
nature of a hydro. There is no superfluous ornamentation, neither
is there too little. The chief beauty lies in that due proportion
which is so prominent a feature in Professor Hoffmann's works.
Nowhere has he shown this better than in the Sanatorium ; at every
step something new is presented to us, something that appeals to our
finer feelings. Everything was designed by Professor Hoffmann
except the salons, and these emanated from Professor Koloman
Moser, who shows here, as always, a fine feeling for colour ; indeed,
he is a great colourist in the arts and crafts.
Professor Hoffmann's lines are more severe ; each room has its special
characteristic, and here we can learn the lesson of the artist's ideals.
Their further development will be seen when the villa which the
Wiener Werkstaette is building for M. Stoclet in Brussels is finished.
What are the artist's ideals ? These may be gathered from his
works, which, though not written, speak a language to us. From them
too we gather where his strength lies, namely, in utility combined
with structural beauty, a quick eye combined with real intellectual
D iv
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
ability, a creative power combined with right judgment for the
exercising of it, a love of form combined with the power of right
adjustment, and a special gift for the practical. How far-seeing he
is can be gathered by the dressmaker's salons he has fitted up for the
Frauleins Floge. The show-rooms are veritable homes of art,
there is nothing obtrusive and no detail has been forgotten.
Everything has its due place even to the electric lamps on the
ground arranged to give light for the adjustment of the customer's
gown. Indeed, these salons are essentially serviceable and artistic.
To him the artistic value is the same, whether it be the simplest
article of everyday use or the most expensive ornament. In
everything it is the thought underlying all which is of the greatest
value ; hence he can have none but thinkers around him. His
workmen must be in sympathy with the artist whose ideas they are
executing, not merely perform their work in a perfunctory manner.
He has given them artistic workshops, he recognizes that their work
too is noble, and that only when they give what is best in them will
they be ennobled and refined by their work and worthy of their hire.
He has travelled much and seen much, he knows what other nations
are producing in art, and is jealous for his own country. He has also
given much care to the solving of the bent-wood and wicker problems
in furniture, in which he has been ably supported by Messrs. J. and
J. Kohn, and the Prag-Rudniker Korbwaren Fabrication, Vienna.
Professor Moser is also a man of manifold powers. There is hardly
a branch of applied art to which he has not turned his hand. He
has studied, too, in workshops, in glass manufactories, in textile and
other manufactories, and everywhere has gained knowledge, and the
experience gained he has put to good use. To know the value ot
the materials in which a design is to be executed — their intrinsic
value — means much to the artist. Like all the men of the modern
school, he has an eye to utility, for utility should be the basis of all
applied art, and therefore it is for this reason that he has given so
much attention to the articles of everyday use, even beyond such as
are made in the Wiener Werkstaette. The glass designed by him
has won praise outside his own country ; the latest development is
the application of the square — a prominent feature in both Professor
Hoffmann's and Professor Moser's designs — to glass ; some very fine
results have been achieved, and an additional charm has been given
by making all the wine-glasses and tumblers of the same height.
There must be nothing to disturb the harmony ; no discordant
strain.
In his interiors, as in all things, Professor Moser shows the same
D v
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
right feeling. His artistic balance is well poised, both his hand
and his judgment are unerring. His strength lies within himself;
he, too, is a creative power, but of another genre. His mind
is a fertile one, filled with rich stores of fancy ; his colouring is
warm but well modulated, and his taste perfect. He has evolved
an art for himself — an art peculiarly his own and at once recog-
nisable. If his designs do not show the masterly dignity of Professor
Hoffmann's, yet they possess a charm and beauty revealing not
only the true artist but the true Viennese.
These two men, Professor Hoffmann and Professor Moser, have
created a new style in decorative and applied art, a style which is
essentially Viennese ; and although they have learned much from
other schools, theirs bears the unmistakable mark by which it will
in the future always be recognized as Hoffmann and Moser. Both
men are far-seeing, and they will continue to advance. New
developments are continually taking place, some branches shoot
forth, others are lopped off. Each artist is a resource in himself, and
each holds the future of Austrian applied art dear to him.
Professor Czescka is another power in the Wiener Werkstaette and
a true artist in every sense of the word. Since Baron Myrbach's
resignation he has become a teacher at the Kunstgewerbe-Schule, and
his pupils are already giving evidence of his influence. His forte lies
in decorative work. The casket here reproduced (D. 67) is a fine
specimen of his conceptive power. It was presented to the Emperor-
King Franz Josef by Messrs. Skoda & Co., the torpedo manufacturers,
and has been lent by his Imperial Majesty for the exhibition
now being held in London. It is 53 centimetres long, 37^ wide, and
20 high. The fourteen columns are supported by ivory feet. These
divide the sides into ten panels bearing seven different designs. In
the middle one is seen the Imperial arms specially arranged for this
purpose by the professor. The panels to the right and left show
two men-of-war armed by Messrs. Skoda and borne along the waves
by sea monsters. All the designs are beaten into the silver, which
is richly gilded over. The lining is formed of silk braids of yellow
and black, the Imperial colours. The casket is a veritable work of
art, both in design and workmanship, and was made by the Wiener
Werkstaette.
Frau Elena Luksch-Makowsky is a strength in herself. Her
designs, be they for beaten metal work, ornaments or ceramics, show
precision, beauty of conception, rich and fertile imagination, and
sure technique in expression. She possesses varied talents, and her
work is always interesting. In all that she does, whether great or
D vi
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
small, there is underlying truth. There is power and there is
character in her work, a delight and a surety which are convincing
of her real love for it.
Professor Olbrich, from his adopted home in Darmstadt, exercises
his influence chiefly in Germany. His noble designs, simple in
their construction as they appear to the uninitiated, bear the impress
of a great mind. Like Professor Hoffmann, his strength lies in
construction combined with rare beauty and simplicity of form.
His interiors show deep thought and intense feeling for what lies
before him. All he has created gives evidence of his richness in
ideas nobly conceived and nobly executed.
Leopold Bauer, who is a leading member of the " Secession," and
holds a foremost place both as an architect and decorative artist,
began his career by throwing off all traditions. This may be seen
in his architecture as well as in his interiors, and the results were
highly satisfactory to those interested in the modern movement.
He met with much success. His first inttrjeurs show the influence
of the quadratic in ornamentation which is so prominent a feature
of the modern Viennese school. Later his opinions changed, and
he came to the conclusion, not without much thought, that all
development must proceed in natural order. For this reason he is
little influenced in his later work by foreign schools of decorative
art. He feels that the architect is not supreme in the arrange-
ment of a home, that in decorating he must take into account
the persons who are to inhabit it, that they must feel that it
is really a home. We all love certain treasured articles in our
homes, and cling to them for the memories they recall. Such are
our friends, and were they banished by the dictatorial architect, it
would cause us pain. Leopold Bauer understands this, and attempts
nothing radical. The favoured piece shall have its right place, due
respect must be paid to it. Yet his interiors do not suffer from this
liberality of thought and judgment, for he has too fine a sense of
rhythm to allow this to jar, the harmony is still preserved, but the
old form is the key-note for the orchestra which is to fill the room
with beautiful music. In this lies Bauer's success. He understands
his art and he understands man. His interiors bear the stamp of
intimacy. This Bauer aims at, and this he achieves.
Jan Kotera is a Bohemian and lives at Prague. As a decorative
artist he has gained much fame. His art necessarily differs from
that of the Austrians, for the natures of the peoples are different, and
the nature of a man is expressed in his work. He is a true Wagner
disciple, accurate and just, and possesses a fine feeling for form.
D vii
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
Josef Urban is a leading member of the Hagenbund Society, and
generally arranges its exhibitions. He is fertile in thought, rich in
imagination, and ever open to receive a lesson, and for this reason he
has learned when to curb his thoughts and when to express them.
His work has warmth of tone and a right sense of concord. He
clothes his walls in silks and in brocades. His furniture is well
thought out; there is no over-burthen of decoration, which yet has
its due place. His interiors have a peculiar charm and delicacy,
they are dainty but never merely pretty. They express the rhythmic
swaying tones of a Strauss waltz, for he is a Viennese to the core.
He is versatile, as are all these Austrians, with a quick eye and a
rapid hand to grasp an idea and to express it. Alfred Keller is
another member of the Hagenbund, and is doing good work.
Oskar Laske is the architect of the " Jungbund," and is very successful
in decorative work and as arrangeur. Marcel Kammerer and Emil
Hoppe are also coming men. They are pupils of Otto Wagner.
Adolf Loos believes, like Bauer, that in every home the architect
should take into account, when planning the room, that ancient pieces
should have their right place, but the harmony must be preserved.
There is no reason why they should be banished to undignified places
not worthy of them. What is to be avoided is the striking of a false
note, and it lies in the artist's power to prevent this. As long
as the harmony is preserved a few grace notes will not destroy it.
So a lamp given by a treasured friend, a table or some other object
dear to its owner, must have its honoured place. He has a preference
for fine-grained mahogany, and, as all really good architects should
do, chooses the woods himself. In many respects he differs radically
from the other Austrian designers. He believes it is impossible to
" find " new forms for chairs, and never attempts to use any but
copies of real old English styles, which he considers the best in
existence. And here again must a good word be said for the
Austrian workmen — nowhere are there more excellent ones, and the
copies made in Vienna, by the fineness of their finish, equal in
beauty those made in England. Adolf Loos' walls are panelled
below with spaces for pictures, while for the upper part he uses
English or Japanese wall-papers. He delights in warmth, and is
much influenced by English and American art in decoration.
Robert Orley has lately come to the fore as a decorative artist and
architect. He studied under Friedrich Schmidt, the predecessor of
Otto Wagner at the Academy of Arts. His principles are as sound
as is his judgment. He aims at comfort in homes ; " modern but not
extravagant " is his motto. He has been much influenced by the
D viii
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
great movement going on around him, and has known what to
adopt and what to reject ; and out of this he has formed a style
peculiarly his own and generally appreciated. He knows the value
of the study of the materials in which a design is to be carried out,
and adapts himself accordingly.
Baron Krauss joined the army of moderns long after he had begun
to practise as an architect and decorator. He also is a pupil of
Friedrich Schmidt. As a decorative artist and architect he has
made his power felt. His aim is simplicity combined with comfort.
His chief work is seen in the provinces, where he has built several
villas and entirely furnished and decorated them. The interior
decorations of the " Burgertheater," Vienna, which he built and
decorated, show that it is possible to have artistic arrangements even
when the money — an important but unfortunately necessary factor
— is limited.
Otto Prutscher, Hans Ofner, Franz Messner, Wilhelm Schmidt,
are all pupils of Professor Hoffmann, following in their master's
footsteps. They have appreciated his teaching too well to neglect
utility in what they produce. The right balance between art and
utility is a prominent feature in the modern Austrian school. All
the students at the Kunstgewerbe-Schule have drunk deep of this
learning. Each element must have its due place and harmonise
with its surroundings, and all conflicting elements must be avoided.
There must be a surety in the building up of the whole. Otto
Prutscher is rich in ideas and possesses a lively phantasy and a fine
sense of harmony in line and colour. His strength lies in the
interior decoration of the house and what pertains to it. Ziilow
has been successful in decorative furniture of another genre,
namely, the adapting of the traditional designs of the peasants to
modern art.
Many women, too, are to the fore in the applied arts. Before the
modern movement they were chiefly interested in the old methods
of coloured embroidery in silks, of flowers and other designs. The
workmanship was always good, for the Austrian women excel in
needlework of all kinds. Now they are taught on nature's system,
and at the Imperial Kunstgewerbe-Schule they learn all branches of
applied art, and by turning their thoughts to the simplest articles of
every-day life are opening up a new field in art. The women students
can turn their hand to most things, as can the men. Furniture
building and architecture do not come within their scope, but all
household properties do, and just in these they meet with success.
The Austrian lady's linen closet is to her what the china closet is
D ix
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
to the Englishwoman. Here art has a place, and the work is
especially suitable for women. The bed linen is a source of joy to
all, not for its elaborateness but for its simplicity. Fraulein Marietta
Peyfuss has designed some fine pillow-cases and " Kappendecken "
— these correspond to the upper sheet in England and button
over on to the quilt, the corners being mitred. Fraulein Peyfuss's
table-cloths are original, and at the same time works of art.
Fraulein Uchatius, Fraulein Hollman, Fraulein Exner, Fraulein
Sodoma, Frau Taussig-Roth, are each doing their share in the
promotion of decorative art. Fraulein Trethahn has designed some
tea and coffee services and toilette sets which, though original, bear
traces of the new school. Fraulein Wachsmann has designed wall-
papers, linings for books, carpets and other textiles which show
fine feeling and sound technique. Fraulein Sika has turned her
talents to electric pendants and table decorations, including tea and
coffee services ; Baroness Falke to ceramics and electric standard
lamps. Some of these men and women artists have formed a small
society called " Kunst im Hause."
Fraulein von Starck is teacher of the art of enamelling at the
Kunstgewerbe-Schule, which in itself is the best testimony of her
capabilities. Bruno Emmel, B. Loffler and E. Powolny are
devoting themselves to ceramics. In the course of time each
artist may perhaps devote attention solely to some particular
branch. Being many sided, as is but natural considering who are
their teachers, they are trying their strength in every direction, and
each is doing his share in raising the standard of Austrian
decorative art.
A new generation is also arising at the Imperial School of Em-
broidery, where, under the teaching of B. Loffler, Fraulein Betty
Stooss, Fraulein Guttmann, and others are searching new methods
for carrying out their own designs in embroidery, and what is
generally called fancy work. The Kunst-Schule fur Frauen und
Madchen is also doing valuable work ; two of Professor Bohm's
students, Frau Sakuka-Harlinger and Fraulein Podhajska, have done
some good decorative work and are excellent in modern toys, which
subject does not come within the scope of this work.
Many men are devoting themselves to special branches of the arts
and crafts. Gustav Gurschner, whose bronzes are known far and
wide, is also a sculptor ; Ernst Stohr is a painter and mural
decorator ; Maximilian Lenz is a painter, yet he has designed some
beautiful electric lamps in beaten silver ; Friedrich Kb'nig is a
painter and designer — this reads like the old signboards ; Engelhart
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
is a painter, a sculptor and a craftsman ; indeed, nothing is more
astonishing than the versatility of these Austrian artists.
In Austria there is little opportunity for the artist as far as fireplaces
are concerned. This is a land of stoves, which are much better
adapted to warming the rooms and equally distributing the heat
than open fires. Therefore the artist must devote his talents to
designing such things as tiles and door plates, for which, however,
there is little demand, the question of cost being important. It
must be remembered that here flats are the rule ; they are built
for the purpose of letting as cheaply as possible, and all unnecessary
outlay must be carefully avoided. In some few villas there are open
fireplaces, but they are not in favour because they do not give out
sufficient heat to warm all parts of the room, which is a very
important consideration in this cold climate. Therefore for the artist
there only remains the gas stove, which is generally welcomed. Here
all the artists mentioned have employed their thoughts and talents, and
some very fine designs have been made by the leading men, many of
them with fine mantelpieces, which were unknown till within the last
few years. Electric lighting is coming more and more into vogue.
This gives a splendid opportunity to the artist, and here again the
leading men, including Professor Hoffmann, Professor Moser, Urban,
Bauer, Krauss, Prutscher, Ofner, have done some excellent work.
With wall-papers few artists have concerned themselves, for the reason
that they are not in demand. A visit to the leading firms taught me
that most are imported from England and Germany, where the cost
of manufacturing is far less than here. Neither do the leading
architects use paper for their wall surfaces. Professor Hoffmann
uses either rough cement or stuccoed mortar, or stains the walls
to harmonise with the furniture, and heads them with a frieze,
the design, of course, conforming to the furniture. Many architects
use silk, or a special kind of textile which looks like buttercloth, and
has the advantage of being washable and cheap. This is sometimes
used in natural colour, and sometimes has a special design made
by the artist. Wood, too, plays an important part in wall surfaces,
especially in dining-rooms ; this generally reaches about one-third
of the height, the upper part being stained and headed with a frieze.
The Prag-Rudniker Korbwaren Fabrication have even found a use for
shavings for wall surfaces which were designed by W. Schmidt.
They form a good background for wicker furniture.
The curtains are simple. Some very fine results have been achieved
by the application of a simple geometrical design on white or cream
lustre specially manufactured for this purpose. This is very effective
D xi
MODERN DECORATIVE ART IN AUSTRIA
and at the same time very practical. Chintz and cottons of the
simplest designs, spotted or checked, which have the advantage of
being cheap, form artistic hangings, and are used by many leading
architects. The chief thing is artistic value combined with
utility ; hangings may be very expensive and yet, from an artistic
point of view, valueless. White batiste, of a special design, is also
favoured, especially by Adolf Loos.
Stained-glass windows are rarely seen in the residential flats or houses.
Professor Moser, Professor Mehoffer, Professor Roller and other
artists have designed some very fine windows for the " Secession," for
public buildings and for churches. They have also designed some
beautiful mosaics. Few, except Professor Moser, have turned their
thoughts to glass. He excels in this, for he understands the nature
of the material. Some of his pupils follow in his footsteps, and
with fairly good results. In silver-plate much could be done were
the public educated up to a due appreciation of art. As it is, the
so-called " Secession," which is nothing but a base imitation of the
real thing, finds buyers, and often at a cost equal to the genuine.
Matters are mending ; everywhere there is a desire to understand art ;
there is movement, and that means much ; anything is better than
the dead monotony of a few years ago. The manufacturers need
educating, as do the public, for Austria does not in this respect
differ from other countries.
# *
The work of the Wiener Werkstaette appearing in this Volume
is reproduced by kind permission of Herr Hofrat Alex, Kochy
Editor of t( Deutsche Kunst und Dekoration" Darmstadt.
r> xu
D 1 B. LOFFLER AND M. POWOLNY
CERAMIC FIGURE
D 2 BRUNO EMMEL
POTTERY EXECUTED BY GEBRUDER
REDLICH, GOEDING, MORAVIA
D 3 PROF. KOLOMAN MOSER
FRUIT STAND IN SILVER SET WITH STONES EXECUTED
BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY PERMISSION OF
HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
D 4 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
D 5 PROF. KOLOMAN MOSER
FRUIT STAND AND FLOWER POT IN GALVANISED
IRON ENAMELLED WHITE EXECUTED BY THE
WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY PERMISSION OF HERR
HOFRAT KOCH)
O 6 GUSTAV GURSCHNER
D 7 BRUNO EMMEL
PALM POT IN BRONZE
POTTERY EXECUTED BY GEBRUDER
REDLICH, GOEDING, MORAVIA
D 8 & 9 J. SIKA
TOILET WARE EXECUTED BY J. BOCH VIENNA
RED AND WHITE GLASS VASES EXECUTED
BY BAKALOWITS & SONS VIENNA
<
«
o
o
z
o
h
(f)
T.
z
3
o
o
cc
Q-
cc H
UJ <
Z c
o z
UJ O
o >-
z m
O h
CO 01
z
z
o
o
cc
E
o
o
o
*
0.
«
0
0>
D 15 OTTO PRUTSCHER
D 17 & 18 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
HAND PAINTED BON
BONNIERE
D 16 PROF. KOLOMAN MOSER
SILVER BROOCH SET WITH
STONES EXECUTED BY THE
WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY
PERMISSION OF HERR
HOFRAT KOCH
JEWEL BOX IN PAINTED MAPLE AND CLOCK
IN HAMMERED METAL AND MARBLE EXE-
CUTED BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE
(BY PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
D 19 & 20 OTTO PRUTSCHER
CIGARETTE AND CARD CASES EXE-
CUTED BY R. MELZER JUN., VIENNA
JEWEL CASE IN ROSEWOOD INLAID WITH
MOTHER OF PEARL AND VARIOUS WOODS
EXECUTED BY JOHANN BAUWIC, VIENNA
D 21 PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
CIGAR BOX IN SILVER SET VflTH STONES
EXECUTED BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY
PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
O 22 PROF KOLOMAN MOSER
BOOKBINDING IN MOROCCO INLAID EXE-
CUTED BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE
(BY PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
5
I
f
ui tr
X S
o z
z y
I
II
z >
!<: 3
LJ UJ
* 5
O «>
5 °
< ul
35
m -i
1
,,rws^vvo SV^fcaMlttaMiV ' ' ' ^ •' ^ '' '
D 27 E. SUMETSBERGER
LEATHER JEWEL CASE EXE
CUTED BY B. BUCHWALD VIENNA
D 28 V. SCHOENTHONER
D 29 OTTO PRUTSCHER
oooooo oooooo
LEATHER BLOTTING CASES EXE-
CUTED BY B. BUCHWALD VIENNA
JRBAN.
mm
. T>
CAi
EXE
IENNA
C.MOENTHONER
D 29 OTTO PRUTSCHER
D 30 PROF. HEINRICH LEFLER & JOSEF URBAN.
,.THE SLEEPING BEAUTY "-ILLUSTRATION TO "THE FAIRY STORY
CALENDAR" (BY PERMISSION OF GERLACH & WIEDLING, VIENNA).
O 33 FERD. ANDRI
D 34 KARL FAHRINGER
O 35 IGN. TASCHNER
D 36 IGN. TASCHNER
^'*A^ ^^^
D 37 IGN. TASCHNER
ILLUSTRATIONS FROM CHILDREN'S BOOKS PUB
LISHFO BY GERLACH & WIEDLING, VIENNA
D 39 OTTO TAUSCHEK
D 40 FERD. ANDRI
D 41 FERD. ANDRI
D 42 FERD. ANDRI
D 43 IGN. TASCHNER
ILLUSTRATIONS FROM CHILDREN'S BOOKS PUB-
LISHED BY GERLAOH &. WIEDLING. VIENNA
URBAN.
,. MANSCHEN, WILT THOU DANCE ?"— ILLU.V
. XLIWS-Kl ANG-GLORIA"— A COLLECTION Of fO'.f. AND
CHILOffEN'S SONQS TO BE PUBLISHED SMCR'tV *V
r. TEttPtKY, VIENNA, it Q. FREYTAO, LEIP/l*
O 4O FERO. ANORI
A*«
1 $J
<f 1-y
y
0 43 ION. TASCHNER
PUB-
D -44 PROF. HEINRICH LEFLER & JOSEF URBAN.
,,HANSCHEN, WILT THOU DANCE? "-ILLUSTRATION TO
,,KLING-KLANG-GLORIA" — A COLLECTION OF FOLK AND
CHILDREN'S SONGS TO BE PUBLISHED SHORTLY BY
F. TEMPSKY, VIENNA, & G. FREYTAG, LEIPZIG
O 45 PROF. KOLOMAN MOSER
D 46 OTTO PRUTSCHER
GLASSWARE EXECUTED BY BAKA
LOWITS & SONS, VIENNA
ELECTRIC LIGHT PENDANTS EXECUTED
BY BAKALOWITS & SONS VIENNA
D 47 PROF. KOLOMAN MOSER
GLASSWARE EXECUTED BY BAKA-
LOWITS & SONS VIENNA
D 48 EMIL HOPPE
TABLE LAMPS AND FLOWER STANDS EXE
CUTEO BY BAKALOWITS & SONS, VIENNA
X
o
t/>
D
cc
Q.
O
o
_
O <
< E
Q o
Z
UJ Q
0. S X O
. SB*
•
O <0
111 Z
X O
_i < z <
UJ Q. < CD
y i
O h
UJ <
Cl
Q
.
D 55 & 66 BARONESS FALKE
TABLEWARE EXECUTED BY
BAKALOWITZ & SONS, VIENNA
D 57—61 /PROF. JOSEF HOFFMANN
SILVER SPOONS EXECUTED BY
THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE (BY
PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
z
<
.
O
I
O
"55
Q °- O
ul > x
h S
O £ <
ill p £
x I- £
ul u| O
i
z
2
m I- S
Z
Z
O
I
O
a:
D 66 ELENA LUKSCH MAKOWSKY
COVERS FOR VENTILATORS
IN HAND BEATEN BRASS
D 67 PROF. CZESCKA
CASKETIN BEATENSILVER PRESENTEDTO H.I.M.
FRANZ JOSEF I. BY MESSRS. SKODA & CO.
EXECUTED BY THE WIENER WERKSTAETTE
(BY PERMISSION OF HERR HOFRAT KOCH)
D 70 MAXIMILIAN LENZ
MURAL DECORATION
IN HAMMERED BRASS
t
tr
<
I
o
z
N
Z
I
h
z
1-
o
5
N
I
D 76 OTTO PRUTSCHER
GLASS MOSAIC EXECUTED BY
REMYGIUS GEYLINO, VIENNA
I
u
p
s.
I
o
D 79 & 80 PROF. JOSEF*VON MEHOFFER
..THE ARCHANGELS MICHAEL AND RAPHAEL"
MURAL DECORATION IN THE CHAPEL OF THE
CATHEDRAL AT CRACOW
D 81 PROF. JOSEF VON MEHOFFER
..NOTRE DAME DES VICTOIRES"
DESIGN FOR A WINDOW IN
THE CATHEDRAL' AT FRIBOURG
SWITZERLAND
-
85
ul X
u O
1
D 83 CARL EDERER
STAINED GLASS WINDOW EXECUTED
BY CARL OEYLING'S ERBEN, VIENNA
D 84 FROF. OLBRICH
TAPESTRY IN THE MUSIC ROOM
OF THE GRAND DUKE OF HESSE
u
I
D
IT
Q.
O
o
z
z
O
I
CO
Q
IS
X o "J
LJ a) I
CO Z Z
ui uj o
Piit
P < Q. .
I- 01 (
O £ I
O -iS:
m 5
x
UJ
1-
h-
X
LU
O UJ
H ?-
il
UJ CO
«l
UJ
LU co
UJ
0-
s
_l
<
o
w
UI
Q
Z
z
I
Q
o
cc
O
O
4
cc
o
\m\m\\m\m\m\m\immm\\m
z
z
111
z
o
H
O
cc
<
o
N
Z
I-
UJ 7
O =8
o <
Z X
:<: ^
I
o
E
O
(
' - ~~- -.". - I ~7 . ' ~~~^.~ " - ' .~".'" '. "^-"v^JiUiij. •_'
D 97 & 98 BETTY STOOSS
CUSHION
PORTION OF A TABLE COVER
PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE
CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY
N Holme, Charles
6808 The art-revival in Austria
H64
Live Music Archive
Librivox Free Audio
Metropolitan Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Internet Arcade
Console Living Room
Books to Borrow
Open Library
TV News
Understanding 9/11