Fritz Maierhofer

Fritz Maierhofer, 2012

Fritz Maierhofer (born February 2, 1941 in Vienna ) is an Austrian jewelry designer and artist.

Life and education

Fritz Maierhofer was born on February 2, 1941 in Vienna. He lived with his mother in Brigittenau until the house was destroyed in 1945 and they were evacuated to the countryside. At the end of the Second World War Maierhofer came back to Vienna, to Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus . He attended elementary school and then secondary school. Since it was not financially possible for him to attend an academy, he began an apprenticeship as a goldsmith and silversmith at the jeweler Anton Heldwein in Vienna in 1955. In 1959 Maierhofer passed the journeyman's examination and was then drafted into the armed forces. After completing his military service, he returned to his training company and in 1966, after completing his master craftsman's examination, succeeded atelier director Alfred Seitner.

During his time at Heldwein, Maierhofer mainly dealt with goldsmithing and the processing of precious stones. In 1967 his design of a necklace made of gold and platinum with diamonds was awarded a prize in the jewelery competition of the Vienna State Guild of gold and silversmiths and exhibited at the exhibition "Viennese gold and silver work 1967" in the Museum of Applied Art . In September 1967 Maierhofer left the Heldwein company and went to Andrew Grima in London , where he was in charge of the Omega watch collection from 1969 . He stayed there for three years. However, the everyday activities did not correspond to his idea of creative training, which is why he decided to go self-employed. In 1970 Maierhofer came back to Vienna. In 1972 he married and until 1974 owned a studio in Vienna- Gersthof . In 1975 he bought a farmhouse in the Waldviertel , restored it and set up his studio there.

plant

Maierhofer combines precious metals and steel with acrylic glass because, in his opinion, these materials are complementary. The processing of inexpensive materials enabled him to produce larger objects. According to him, jewelry should not just be an accessory , but an autonomous sculpture. After his return to Austria he concentrated on precious metals and made drafts for works made of silver and gold. The geometric character of his compositions remained unchanged and has been preserved to the present day. In the 1970s he also began making larger objects such as tables. Between 1982 and 1985 Maierhofer experimented with the material tin . This tin work can be bent by the carrier itself. The work was partially stabilized with gold elements. He realized larger objects, including a fountain in Vienna- Kagran .

At the invitation of the "Sir John Cass Foundation", Maierhofer went to London in 1986 for another two years. The architecture of the concrete and steel trussed buildings in the Docklands at that time influenced his work. The metal trusses made of gold and silver became a brooch, a ring, an art object, a sculpture.

Work with new materials

In 1988 Maierhofer returned to Austria and worked with gold and stones again for some time. In the 1990s he discovered aluminum as a material and is still experimenting with it today. His bracelets and chokers are made of eroded and anodized aluminum. In 1998 he shaped the jewelry scene with his exhibition “Der Ring” at Künstlerhaus Vienna .

At the beginning of 2000 Maierhofer came across Corian , a synthetic acrylic stone that is particularly stable, easy to work with and varies in many colors. He mainly processed Corian into rings or brooches and thus again combined a base material with the precious metals gold and silver.

In recent years Maierhofer has concentrated on puristic and reduced work. With his new works of folded anodized aluminum jewelry and his sculptures, he shows a certain calm in his work. In recent times Maierhofer has devoted himself more and more to natural phenomena, such as light and weather moods in the mountains, which inspired him to his new works on paper. Brooches and other objects are made from molded, painted cardboard.

The angel motifs, an inspiration from his stay in Italy in 2013, can be found in Maierhofer's last works as faint prints on aluminum. The puristic shape of the aluminum brooch and the lightness of the landscapes meet in structured objects, the contours of which represent the angel's wings.

Solo exhibitions (selection)

Since 1971, works by Fritz Maierhofer have been shown in numerous jewelry exhibitions in galleries and museums in Germany, numerous European countries, the USA and Japan.

2008: Fritz Maierhofer . Caroline Van Hoek, Contemporary Jewelery Gallery, Brussels, Belgium
2006: Fritz Maierhofer - jewelry has no limits . Künstlerhaus Vienna , Austria
1998: Traude Fritsch asks: Fritz Maierhofer - new work from England

Awards

2003: Awarded the title of Professor by the Republic of Austria
1990: Austrian Design Award
1987: Award "Jablonec 87"
1986–87: Research Fellowship from Sir John Cass College of Art, London, England
1981: Award “Diamonds Today”, Munich, Germany
1972: Award from the Vienna Art Association
1972: Award at the international jewelry competition of the jewelry museum, Pforzheim, Germany

Works in public collections

MAK , Vienna; Ministry of Art and Education, Vienna; Lower Austrian provincial government; Jewelry museum Pforzheim ; Victoria & Albert Museum , London; Goldsmith's Hall, London; National Museum of Scotland , Edinburgh; Art Gallery of Western Australia , Perth; Pinakothek der Moderne - Danner Foundation, Munich; Royal College of Art - Study Collection, London; Landesmuseum Joanneum , Graz; Inge Asenbaum Collection, Vienna; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston - Helen Williams Drutt Collection; Lotte Reimers Foundation, Deidesheim, Germany; Racine Art Museum , Racine , USA; as well as various private collections.

literature

Fritz Maierhofer: Gold and silversmith. Galerie am Graben, Vienna 1982.
Jane Stancliffe, Richard Edgcumbe: Fritz Maierhofer. V&A Press, London 1987, ISBN 1-85177-090-9 .
Gabriela Koschatzky-Elias: Fritz Maierhofer Jewelery and More !. Arnoldsche Art Publishers, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-89790-245-1

Anna Beatriz Chadour, Andreas Freisfeld: Jewelry pieces, The impulse of modernity in Europe. Klinkhardt & Biermann, Munich 1991, ISBN 3-7814-0294-0 .
Exhibition catalog: Turning Point. Sheffield Galleries & Museums Press, Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-9501168-0-X .
Clare Phillips: Jewels and Jewelery. V&A Publications, London 2000, ISBN 1-85177-279-0 .
David Watkins: The Best in Contemporary Jewelery. Quarto Publishing plc, London 1993, ISBN 0-8230-6361-5 .
Fritz Falk, Cornelie Holzach: Modern jewelry. Arnoldsche Art Publishers, Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 3-925369-81-3 .
Galerie Eugen Lendl: Five of a Kind. Graz 2010, ISBN 978-3-200-02086-3 .
Gregory Arch: Minimal Rings. Full Spectrum Publishing, Waynesville 2003, ISBN 0-9747673-0-1 .
Helen Williams Drutt: Ornament as Art. Arnoldsche Art Publishers, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-89790-273-2 .
Helen Williams Drutt, Peter Dormer: Jewelry of our time. Thames and Hudson Ltd, London 1995, ISBN 0-8478-1914-0 .
Helmuth Gsöllpointer: jewelry, signs on the body. Falter Verlag, Vienna 1987, ISBN 3-85439-051-3 .
Joanna Hardy: Contemporary Jewelry: Crafts for Collectors. Deutscher Kunstverlag, London 2012, ISBN 3422071016 .
John Zukowsky, Ian Wardropper: Austrian Architecture and Design, Beyond Tradition in the 1990s. The Art Institute of Chicago and Ernst & Sohn Verlag, Berlin 1991, ISBN 3-433-02341-7 .
Martina Margetts: International Crafts. Thames and Hudson Ltd, London 1991, ISBN 0-500-01522-8 .
Musée des Arts Décoratifs: IIIème Triennale du bijou. Editions du May, Paris 1992, ISBN 2-906450-86-3 .
Rachel Church: Rings. V&A Publishing, London 2011, ISBN 978-1-85177-650-4 .
Renate Slavik: Art Meets Jewelery. Arnoldsche Art Publishers, Stuttgart 2010, ISBN 978-3-89790-332-6 .
Robert Bell: Perth international crafts triennial. Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth 1989, ISBN 0-7309-0751-1 .
Susan Cohn: Unexpected Pleasures. Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., New York 2012, ISBN 978-0-8478-3814-1 .
Vannetta Seecharran: Jewelry design today, innovative materials and techniques. Haupt Verlag, 2010, ISBN 3258600015 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Maierhofer, Fritz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Austrian jewelry designer and artist
DATE OF BIRTH	February 2, 1941
PLACE OF BIRTH	Vienna