Hans Fronius

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Hans Fronius (born September 12, 1903 in Sarajevo ; † March 21, 1988 in Mödling ) was an Austrian painter , graphic artist and illustrator .

Life

Childhood and academic years

Hans Fronius was born in Sarajevo on September 12, 1903. His father Fritz Fronius came from a patrician family from Transylvania . As the city ​​physician of Sarajevo, he belonged to the highest class of civil servants in Austria. His mother was the granddaughter of the Viennese Biedermeier painter and engraver Johann Nepomuk Passini . Her uncle was Ludwig Passini . In his autobiography, Picture Book of a Life , he describes how strongly childhood and youth were embedded in the historical background of the crumbling Habsburg Empire . On June 28, 1914, when he was almost eleven, he was an eyewitness to the assassination attempt on the heir to the throne, Franz Ferdinand . According to Dieter Ronte , this event has always permeated his artistic work. In 1987 he brought this world historical event back to life as an individual experience in 32 black and white chalk drawings. A leaf with the torn double-headed eagle as a plucked state symbol concludes this cycle. At the end of July 1914 he moved to Graz with his mother and sister . After the war, their father followed them.

Goya: The shooting of the insurgents on May 3, 1898

From 1922 to 1928 Fronius studied at the Vienna Academy with Professors Karl Sterrer and Alois Delug . The student eluded the academic historicism of his teachers and his traditional formal language. His interest in art history and painting was in the works of Charles Meryon and the horrors of Goya . The eight-year-old was already fascinated by a reproduction of Goya's painting “The Shooting of the Insurgents on May 3, 1808” . He saw it as an initial spark for his artistry. Furthermore, James Ensor , Edvard Munch and the German Expressionists were sources of inspiration. In his Fronius monograph, Wolfgang Hilger emphasizes that the woodcut, with its sharp contrasts of light and dark, offered itself as the ideal medium. In his search for spiritual affinities, the encounter with Kafka's literary work opened up a world of ideas for him, which immediately pushed him to graphic design. The early turn to literary topics was essential for Fronius. As a high school student he tried his hand at the illustrator of Georg Büchner's “ Dantons Tod ”, and the works of Tolstoy , Dostoyevsky and Chekhov also cast a spell over the student. According to Hilger, he felt an elective affinity with those poets who “knew how to depict the extreme situations in life, human fates and the question of culpability,” this closeness to literature shaped Fronius and all of his later work.

On study trips during the holidays, which the father of his painter friend Dolf Winternitz made possible for them, he got to know the most important art centers in Europe. The main destinations of the trips through Italy, Germany, Holland, Denmark and France were the picture galleries of the large museums.

Teachers and artists

The correspondence with Alfred Kubin

Lovis Corinth: Ecce Homo (1925)

In 1930 Fronius decided to take the teaching exams for art education , mathematics and descriptive geometry . This gave him a secure existence at the Fürstenfeld secondary school in Eastern Styria and then from 1960 to 1965 in Mödling near Vienna, which enabled him to pursue his artistic activities. With the dedication of the ten-part woodcut series from 1931 to Kafka's story “ The Metamorphosis ” to Alfred Kubin , whom Fronius admired , he achieved an artistic breakthrough. The approval that the twenty-eight-year-old received from the much older Kubin encouraged him to continue on the path he had chosen. A lively correspondence and artist friendship began, which lasted until Kubin's death. They were accompanied by rich reciprocal book and graphic gifts. The exchange of ideas not only focused on clarifying the basic positions of one's own work, on art and reading experiences, communicating personal blows of fate and pecuniary worries, it also included criticism of the political events of the time. For example, Fronius reports on the evacuation of the Roma from the settlement in Rudersdorf, describes his torture when visiting the exhibition Degenerate Art in Munich. It was downright hellish, hardly bearable. Above the grinning civilians and uniformed visitors, the beautiful head of Christ in the Ecce Homo picture by Corinth “always remained visible with a wonderful, tortured expression.” He describes how much the “cleansing operations” in the libraries reminded him of Kafka's world: “That is as if the ukase had been written in Kafka's "castle". "

Fronius in the time of Austrofascism

Hans Fronius, a member of the Graz Secession since 1923 , continued to paint during the Nazi era in what the Nazis called the "degenerate style" of Expressionism . After the first exhibition of his illustrations for Kafka's work took place in 1936 at Max Brod's instigation in the Prager Kunstverein, he had to take a position in Graz in front of a Nazi commissioner for art affairs because of his “Jewish illustrations” and pledge to be loyalty . Since he was threatened with dismissal from school, he made the desired declaration of loyalty out of consideration for his family. In a letter to Kubin of January 9, 1938, he reported that the works he showed in an exhibition in Graz, mostly woodcuts, had been criticized as "not German" and "emphatically supranational". Since he continued to work without stylistic and thematic adaptation, exhibitions were repeatedly banned. During the war, Fronius was initially employed as a draftsman at the siege of Leningrad, then in Italy until the end of the war. During a short vacation in 1944, 26 chalk drawings of Suetons Nero were made from the emperor's biographies, selected scenes “lined up like a film”. Otto Breicha titled his essay on the cycle “that Nero who actually was Hitler.” Fronius reflected Hitler's machinations in the megalomaniac and criminal goings-on of the Roman model. The result is twenty-six illustrative illuminations of the deformity of the despot.

The time as a freelance artist

In 1961 Fronius moved to Perchtoldsdorf near Vienna. After another three years of teaching, Fronius worked as a freelance painter from 1964. This was followed by an intense creative phase that only ended with his death in 1988.

Act

The artistic work of Hans Fronius has long received considerable art-historical recognition. Monographic exhibitions and publications open up his extensive artistic oeuvre, which has a prominent place in the Austrian art history of the 20th century and has so far been honored with numerous prizes.

His painterly and graphic work is known as 'Expressive Realism' due to his spontaneous gesture, great narrative power and fantastic imagination. The thematic range extends from portraits and literary motifs to images of nature and cities. Fronius also works as an illustrator and publishes a total of 115 books and portfolios. His illustrations for works by Franz Kafka and Edgar Allan Poe , which are known to a wide audience, are particularly important . In his autobiographical publication Picture Book of a Life , Fronius explains that in his work he is committed to the “constellation Goya, Ensor, Kubin ”. The confrontation with the work and ideas of the triumvirate takes place in his painterly and graphic work through paraphrases and variations of motifs and themes, but also through imagined portraits, such as in the etchings Goya, Ensor, Kubin . In Goya's work, he was fascinated by his “artistic span” from the highest joie de vivre to the most radical negation, with Ensor the subject of mask images and the light that “gives his colors and his drawings the fascinating spiritual transparency”. The friendship with Kubin was based on personal encounters, exchanges of ideas and mutual sympathy. However, he had distanced himself from Kubin's mindset, which was shaped by Nietzsche , and his romantic horror. His work is rather determined by "the bottomlessness" and the "metaphysical fear", for which Kafka found the strongest expression.

Honorary grave at the Perchtoldsdorf cemetery

In 1951, after separating from his first wife, Fronius entered into a second marriage with Christine Lauberger, an art historian. The two marriages had six children. The correspondence with Alfred Kubin reports on the death of the firstborn. After the artist's death, Christin Fronius looked after and supported his life's work through publications and exhibitions. Generous donations from the artist's widow brought drawings, prints and two dozen oil paintings to the “Religious Collection - Hans Fronius” collection at the Sankt Florian monastery .

Honors

  • Hans Fronius was buried in a grave of honor at the Perchtoldsdorf cemetery .
  • A memorial stone was erected in a green area on the forecourt of the Fürstenfeld town hall.
  • The Fronius floodplains on the Lafnitz between Rudersdorf and Fürstenfeld on the municipality of Fürstenfeld were named after him or are commonly known as that - they contain a nature reserve.

Awards

Works

  • The shooting , 1979, oil on hardboard, approx. 80 × 120 cm, Heeresgeschichtliches Museum , Vienna.
  • The Jewish Grave , 1984, oil on hardboard, approx. 60 × 40 cm, Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna.
  • East Styrian landscape , 1960
  • Dance of death
  • Samy Molcho 1968, pantomime scene, 63 × 36.5 cm, oil on hardboard; on the back: violin player

Literature (selection)

Catalog raisonnés
  • Hans Fronius. Drawing, graphic, book illustration . Introduction by Otto Benesch . With a catalog of works (1929–1952) by Werner Hofmann . Leykam Verlag, Graz 1953.
  • Walter Koschatzky : Hans Fronius. Images and shapes . With a catalog of all woodcuts, lithographs and etchings from 1922 to 1972 by Leopold Rethi. (= Austrian contemporary graphic artists, vol. 8). Edition Tusch, Vienna 1972.
  • Fronius. The graphic work 1922–1987 . With an essay by Wolfgang Hilger. Catalog of all woodcuts, lithographs and etchings by Leopold Rethi. Edition Tusch, Vienna 1987, ISBN 3850631753 .
  • Fronius: On the graphic work. Additions and corrections to the catalog raisonné from 1922 to 1987 as well as additions from 1921 and 1987 . Compiled by Sigrun Loos with the collaboration of Christin Fronius with an essay by Otto Breicha . Series of publications by the Salzburg State Collections Rupertinum. Verlag Galerie Welz, Salzburg 1992, ISBN 3853491669 .
  • Hans Fronius. Theater drawings . Published by the Landesgalerie at the Upper Austrian State Museum, with essays by Peter Assmann , Friedrich Buchmayr , Martin Hochleitner and Ferdinand Reisinger. Provincial Library, Weitra 2003, ISBN 3-902414-05-7 .
Correspondence
  • Alfred Kubin - Hans Fronius. An artist friendship. Correspondence 1931–1956 . Transcription of the letters and draft of an introduction by Ernst Schremmer. Revised by Sigrun Loos, with the help of Susanne Greimel and Christin Fronius. Provincial Library, Weitra without year, ISBN 3-85252-293-5 .
Monographs
  • Walter Koschatzky: Hans Fronius. Drawings and paintings . Verlag Galerie Welz, Salzburg 1967.
  • Hans Fronius. Picture book of a life . Edited by Kurt Kahl . With 63 reproductions based on drawings, pictures, photographs and documents. Molden Edition Graphische Kunst, Vienna, Munich, Zurich 1978, ISBN 3-217-00891-X .
  • Wolfgang Hilger: Hans Fronius . A monograph. Edition Tusch , Vienna 1979.
  • Hans Fronius Paraphrases / Paraphrases . With an essay by Dieter Ronte / With an Introductory Essay by Dieter Ronte. [German-English edition] Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3608762280 .
  • Terrifying - true. Encounters between Hans Fronius and Otto Mauer . Edited by Bernhard A. Böhler and Christin Fronius with the assistance of Ferdinand Reisinger. Provincial Library, Weitra 2001, ISBN 3-85252-394-X .
  • Fronius, Hans: The assassination attempt in Sarajevo . With a foreword by Dieter Ronte and an essay by Johann Christoph Allmayer-Beck. Verlag Styria, Graz 1988, ISBN 3-222-11851-5 .
  • Hans Fronius: Stations on the way. The Way of the Cross in Thörl . Interpreted by Ferdinand Reisinger. Edited by Franz Majcen and Ferdinand Reisinger. Provincial Library, Weitra 2001, ISBN 3-85252-393-1 .
  • Hans Fronius on his 100th birthday. Data and facts from a long-term encounter compiled by Franz Eder. Galerie Welz, Salzburg 2003, ISBN 3-85349-269-X .
Exhibition catalogs
  • Hans Fronius and Gerhart Kraaz . Two book illustrators of the XX. Century. Books and sheets from the Ulrich von Kritter collection. Exhibition catalog of the Herzog August Library No. 34, Göttingen 1982.
Fronius - Kafka
  • Hans Fronius - Art to Kafka . With a text by Hans Fronius. Introduction by Wolfgang Hilger. Captions Helmut Strutzmann. Edition Hilger, Vienna 1983, ISBN 3-9003-1813-1 .
  • Hans Fronius to Franz Kafka. Pictorial works from 1926 to 1988 . Eds. Peter Assmann and Johann Lachinger, Bibliothek der Provinz, Weitra 1997, ISBN 3-85252-143-2 , (on the occasion of the exhibition Hans Fronius on Franz Kafka - paintings from 1926 to 1988 in Prague (Burg, February / March 1997))
Essays
  • Hans Bergel : Hans Fronius. How literary texts turn into pictures . In: Ders .: Crossroads. Thirteen images of life . Johannis Reeg Verlag, Bamberg 2009, ISBN 978-3-937320-38-0 .
  • Maria Buchsbaum: The ability to summon ghosts. Imaginary portraits by Hans Fronius . In: Morgen, culture magazine from Lower Austria. Volume 5, Number 16, April 1981, pp. 116-117.
  • Maria Buchsbaum: The liberation of light from darkness. The way and work of Hans Fronius . In: Morgen, culture magazine from Lower Austria. Volume 3, number 10, 1979, pp. 351–356.
  • Erich Fitzbauer : Hans Fronius on his 75th birthday on September 11th. The illustrated work 1972–1978 . In: Illustration 63. Magazine for book illustration. 15th year, issue 2, 1978, pp. 40-43.
  • Gregor Gatscher-Riedl: On the 100th birthday of the master of dark topics: Hans Fronius - With the eyes of a humanist. In: Perchtoldsdorfer Rundschau, 9, (Perchtoldsdorf, September 2003), p. 6 f.
  • Gregor Gatscher-Riedl: From Sarajevo to Perchtoldsdorf. For the 100th birthday of Hans Fronius, the master of world theater between Kafka and Kubin. In: Tomorrow. Culture magazine from Lower Austria, 09/2003, (St. Pölten 2003), pp. 34–36.
  • Wolfgang Hilger: Hans Fronius as a painter . In: Parnassus. The Austrian art and culture magazine, Volume III, Issue 6, Linz 1983, pp. 80–81.
  • Hans Adolf Halbey : Illustrations - a graphic reflection. Depicted in works of existential shaking by Kubin, Fronius and Lieselotte Schwarz . In: Inprimatur. A yearbook for book lovers. New Series Volume X, 1982, pp. 108-113.
  • Wolfgang Hilger: The Jewish Quarter in Amsterdam. A cycle by Hans Fronius . In: Illustration 63, Festschrift 30 Years Illustration 63 - 20 Years Graphic Art, Issue 4, 1993, pp. 29–33.
  • Max J. Hiti and Gerd König: Art, literature and theater in Fürstenfeld. Hans Fronius . In: Fürstenfeld. The city history. Fürstenfeld 2000, pp. 693-701.
  • Rüdiger Maria Kampmann: Kubin, Fronius, Löb. Three book illustrators of the 20th century . In: Philobiblon 1993, a quarterly journal for book and graphic collectors, Verlag Ernst Hauswedell & Co., Stuttgart 1993, issue 1, p. 341.
  • Norbert Langer: "Surrounded by the shadow and yet completely there". Hans Fronius on his 80th birthday . In: Sudetenland. European cultural magazine; Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia; Quarterly journal for art, literature, science and folklore 1984, issue 2, pp. 91–96.
  • Norbert Langer: Hans Fronius. The graphic work 1922–1987 (= work catalog. Edition Tusch, Vienna 1987). In: Sudetenland. European cultural magazine; Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia; Quarterly journal for art, literature, science and folklore 1988, issue 2, pp. 221–222.
  • Roswitha Mair: Alfred Kubin - Hans Fronius: Opposites of the absurd . In: Illustration 63. Magazine for book illustration. 37th volume, No. 2, 2000, pp. 43-48.
  • Alexander Marinovic: Light on a dark background. In memoriam Hans Fronius (1903–1988). In: die Kunst, Heft 9, Munich 1988, pp. 714–719.
  • Bruno Saurer: Art and Science at Feistritz and Lafnitz . Hans Fronius and his meadows. In: Campus f. The Fürstenfelder Kulturmagazin, number 24, December 1993, pp. 30-39.
  • György Sebestyén : Fronius and his time. Farewell and review. On the death of the painter and graphic artist on March 21, 1988 . In: Morgen, Kulturzeitschrift aus Niederösterreich, 12th year, issue 59, 1988, pp. 167–168.
  • Rainer Zimmermann : Realism in the fantastic . The art of drawing and visionary colors at Hans Fronius. In: Rainer Zimmermann: Expressive Realism. Painting of the Lost Generation. Munich: Hirmer Verlag 1994, pp. 296-303, 373.
  • Bernd Zimmermann: Hans Fronius . In: Volk und Heimat, monthly magazine for culture and education, vol. 27, issue 2, Eisenstadt 1973, pp. 15-16, 2 illustrations.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Assassination of the Heir to the Throne tvthek.orf.at, June 25, 1984, accessed June 29, 2018. - With video (3:48)
  2. ^ Dieter Ronte, Hans Fronius - Sarajevo. In: Hans Fronius, The attack in Sarajevo. With an afterword by Dieter Ronte and an essay by Johann Christoph Allmayer-Beck. Styria, Graz 1988, pp. 7 and 12.
  3. ↑ Grillparzerstrasse 7, Geidorf district, house with front garden and porch with cloverleaf above it as a facade decoration.
  4. ^ Wolfgang Hilger: Hans Fronius. A monograph. Edition Tusch, Vienna 1979, pp. 6 and 7.
  5. ↑ Hans Fronius on Franz Kafka. Pictorial works from 1926 to 1988. Eds. Peter Assmann and Johann Lachinger, Bibliothek der Provinz, Weitra 1997, p. 21.
  6. ^ Wolfgang Hilger: Fronius. The graphic work 1922-1987, p. 19
  7. ^ Alfred Kubin - Hans Fronius. An artist friendship. Correspondence 1931–1956. Transcription of the letters and draft of an introduction by Ernst Schremmer. Revised by Sigrun Loos, with the help of Susanne Greimel and Christin Fronius. Provincial library, Weitra without a year
  8. ^ Letters from Alfred Kubin to Hans Fronius, letters to Kubin, of July 30, 1939 (p. 230), of August 6, 1937 (p. 132) and of June 21, 1939 (p. 227)
  9. ↑ Fürstenfeld. The history of the city, p. 698
  10. ^ Letters from Alfred Kubin to Hans Fronius, p. 160
  11. ↑ C. Suetonius Tranquilius Nero. From the Latin by André Lambert. Frankfurt am Main 1996, pp. 107-110.
  12. ↑ Hans Fronius: Picture book of a life . Edited by Kurt Kahl. With 63 reproductions based on drawings, pictures, photographs and documents. Molden-Edition Graphische Kunst; Vienna, Munich, Zurich 1978, ISBN 978-3-217-00891-5 , pp. 35–41.
  13. ↑ Gerhard Pferschy (ed.), Fürstenfeld. The city history. Fürstenfeld 2000, p. 699.
  14. ^ Alfred Kubin - Hans Fronius. An artist friendship. Correspondence 1931–1956. Provincial Library, Weitra without year, pp. 214 and 215.
  15. ↑ In later years Fronius' wife called herself a Christian
  16. ↑ Sunrise in the Fronius-Auen Florian Deutsch Photography, floriandeutsch.wordpress.com> furstenfeld, posted August 18, 2013, accessed June 29, 2018. - Another picture.
  17. ↑ GC6DGHD STMK Grillplatz BGLD geocaching.com, hidden March 17, 2016, accessed June 29, 2018. "Section between Rudersdorf and Fürstenfeld (so-called" Fronius-Auen ")" - Refers to: Bruno Saurer: Art and Science at Feistritz and Lafnitz . Hans Fronius and his meadows. In: Campus f . The Fürstenfelder Kulturmagazin, No. 24, December 1993, pp. 30-39.
  18. ↑ Spring knot flower population from parts of the Fronius Auen ROKAT spatial planning cadastre, Provincial Government of Styria, nature reserve, established August 28, 2008, accessed June 29, 2018.
  19. ↑ Assassination of the Heir to the Throne tvthek.orf.at, June 25, 1984, accessed June 29, 2018. - With video (3:48)
  20. ^ Hans Fronius in the Vienna History Wiki of the City of Vienna
  21. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from April 7, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.verwaltung.steiermark.at
  22. ^ Entry on Hans Fronius in the art and research database - Angewandte / basis wien

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Fronius, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian painter
DATE OF BIRTH September 12, 1903
PLACE OF BIRTH Sarajevo
DATE OF DEATH March 21, 1988
Place of death Mödling