Alfred Proksch (graphic artist)

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Alfred Proksch (born December 11, 1908 in Vienna ; † January 3, 2011 there ) was an Austrian graphic artist , illustrator , painter and athlete .

Childhood and youth

Alfred Proksch was born in 1908 in Vienna- Hernals as the son of Ignaz Proksch from Prague and Henriette Gaugusch from Vienna . Proksch's father worked as Prince Schwarzenberg's secretary and as a businessman. After the First World War , the family initially lived in poor conditions, but soon became very prosperous.

After elementary school, Proksch and his four brothers went to boarding schools in Bad Goisern and Waidhofen an der Ybbs . Proksch's great drawing talent was already evident as a schoolboy, and at the age of 15 he was already earning money with illustrations for publishers and the Wiener Magazin , which he produced under the pseudonym Fedor Broskow   . This was followed by a traineeship in the Atelier Zentrum of the painter and graphic artist Fritz Bernhard . Here he was mainly active in poster design and got to know Joseph Binder , who had his studio in the immediate vicinity. In addition, he repeatedly worked in the advertising studio of the traditional coffee company Julius Meinl , which Otto Exinger was running at the time . In 1926/1927 Proksch attended the Vienna School of Applied Arts , where he studied typography with Rudolf von Larisch , and attended drawing courses at the Academy of Fine Arts .

Work as a graphic designer

In 1927 Proksch went into business for himself with his own studio and joined - at the age of only 19 - as one of the first ten members of the Association of Austrian Commercial Graphics (now Design Austria ). When the Great Depression of 1929, his family fell into financial difficulties and the order situation in the field of applied graphics in Vienna deteriorated dramatically, Alfred Proksch went to Berlin and worked there for a year as an illustrator, among other things, for the magazine Uhu of the Ullstein publishing house . But the order situation for graphic designers in Berlin was also bad, so he returned to Vienna, where he worked as a commercial artist in the in-house studio of the shoe manufacturer Hermes (later Regent ), for whom he designed posters and shop window decorations.

In 1933 Proksch married Ida Moser, who worked as a fashion designer and mannequin in Vienna . During the Second World War he was a soldier in the Soviet Union, France and most recently in Albania, where he led a supply unit. During the collapse of Nazi Germany, he came back to Austria and hid first in the Waldviertel and later near Spitz in the Wachau in order to escape Soviet captivity. During this time he got by with occasional jobs as a portrait draftsman . In the post-war period, he and his four children were initially staying with friends in Eichgraben near Vienna. In 1947 Proksch resumed his work as a freelance graphic designer and worked for Regent , as well as for Bally , Humanic and Schmitt shoes . At the beginning of the 1960s he became President of the Association of Austrian Commercial Graphics , where he campaigned primarily for the recognition of graphic design as a self-creative activity at tax offices and authorities. In 1963 he took part in the founding meeting of the world umbrella association for graphic design and visual communication ICOGRADA and organized the first international graphic design congress in Vienna with VISCOM 71.

Proksch worked actively as a graphic designer until he was 70. In 1967 he was awarded the title of professor . In addition, he was honorary president for life of Design Austria . Several of his numerous award-winning posters have been included in the Albertina 's graphic collection . 

On March 13, 2014, Design Austria revoked his honorary membership in a general assembly due to his National Socialist past and war crimes, which were published in an article in Profil magazine on March 19, 2012 after his death.

Artistic work

In addition to targeted commercial graphics , Proksch was also interested in artistic graphics from an early age , in particular figurative representations. His early work in this area from the 30s was influenced by the New Objectivity with clear and calm but memorable lines . With the beginning of the post-war period his style became more expressive and showed parallels to the development of Kokoschka and Schiele . During his professional activity as a graphic designer in the post-war period, Proksch hardly found any opportunity for freelance work; it was only since the 1990s that he began to devote himself intensively to artistic creation, again focusing on people in the form of portraits and nude studies . The works drawn in red chalk , charcoal or colored chalk show a distinctive, dynamic handwriting, which is characterized by countless short, sometimes overlapping lines and can be counted as expressive realism . His work has already been shown in several exhibitions in Vienna, most recently together with works by his son, the Viennese graphic artist and painter Peter Proksch .

Sporting successes

Like his father Ignaz Proksch - co-founder of the Wiener Sport-Club  - Alfred Proksch was active in various athletics disciplines from a young age. At the age of 17 he became the Viennese youth champion in pole vault . As a result, he developed into one of the most successful European pole vaulters of the 1930s. He improved the Austrian record a total of eight times - with his last record of 4.11 m, achieved in London, lasting 15 years - and took part in the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, where he finished sixth. From 1955 to 2005 he was President of the Vienna Cricket and Football Club . At over 100 years of age, he was the oldest member of the Austrian Athletics Association and has successfully participated in numerous World Masters Athletics championships in javelin , discus and shot put in recent years .

Masters medals

Masters European Championship in Athens 1994:

  • Discus, 20.94 m; gold

Masters World Championships in Buffalo 1995:

  • Discus; 22.38 m; silver

Masters World Championships in San Sebastian 2005:

  • Bullet; 3.65 m; gold
  • Discus; 10.53 m; gold
  • Spear; 5.17 m; gold

Masters European Championship in Poznan 2006:

  • Discus 9.76 m; gold
  • Bullet; 4.29 m; gold
  • Spear; 5.87 m; gold

Masters Indoor European Championships in Helsinki 2007:

  • Discus; 9.87 m; gold
  • Bullet; 4.53 m; gold

Masters World Championships in Riccione 2007:

  • Discus; 10.22 m; gold

Masters Indoor World Championships in Clermont-Ferrand 2008:

  • Discus; 8.51 m; gold
  • Bullet; 3.87 m; gold

Masters World Championships in Lahti 2009:

  • Discus; 5.61 m; gold
  • Bullet; 2.84 m; gold

literature

Movies

  • Herbstgold (2010), a film by Jan Tenhaven , portrays Alfred Proksch and four other senior athletes who have the common goal of participating in the 2009 Masters Championships in Lahti, Finland.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Austria's oldest athlete died at the age of 102 ( Memento from May 8, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  2. ↑ Anita Kern: Graphic artist of a century - Alfred Proksch. In: Austrian graphic design in the 20th century. Design Austria, p. 507.
  3. ↑ Design Austria website
  4. ↑ ( Page no longer available , search in web archives: posters by Alfred Proksch in the Albertina graphic collection )@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / gallery.albertina.at
  5. ↑ Design Austria honorary members
  6. ^ Gabriela Koschatzky-Elias: 100 years of Alfred Proksch. The graphic work. Amalthea Signum Verlag, p. 8.
  7. ↑ ( Page no longer available , search in web archives: ÖLV-Nachrichten 07/2008 (PDF; 724 kB) )@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.oelv.at
  8. ↑ a b c d e f g ( page no longer available , search in web archives: Austrian Athletics Association )@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.oelv.at
  9. ↑ World Masters Athletics Championships 2009 (English)
personal data
SURNAME Proksch, Alfred
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Broskow, Fedor (pseudonym)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian graphic artist, illustrator, painter and athlete
DATE OF BIRTH December 11, 1908
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH January 3, 2011
Place of death Vienna