Johann Wolfgang Schaukal

Johann Wolfgang (von) Schaukal (born April 15, 1900 in Mährisch Weißkirchen , † July 30, 1981 in Graz ) was an Austrian painter and folk artist .

Life

Johann Wolfgang von Schaukal was the son of the poet Richard von Schaukal . In 1903 the family moved to Vienna , where Johann Wolfgang graduated from high school and studied chemistry at the University of Vienna from 1918–24 . In addition, he began to be active in drawing and in 1921 and 1922 attended the Royal Art Academy in Stockholm twice, where he had received a free place. He also took courses in etching and lithography at the Graphic Education and Research Institute in Vienna.

Schaukal had been acquainted with the painter Anton Kolig , who later became the head of the Nötscher district , since childhood ; Schaukal's father was one of Kolig's first sponsors. A picture of the Schaukal family that Kolig painted in 1910, which is now in private hands, also shows the then ten-year-old boy. At the beginning of the twenties Kolig intended to set up an artist workshop in Nötsch in Carinthia . In 1922/23 Schaukal went to Kolig as a painting student in Nötsch, where his school friends Bohdan Heřmanský and Gerhart Frankl also stayed.

In the following years Schaukal took part in several exhibitions, worked as a graphic artist for magazines and in 1931 stayed in Berlin as a theater draftsman. After long stays in Paris from 1934–37, he became Herbert Boeckl's private assistant at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. He voluntarily gave up this position in 1938 when the National Socialist troops marched into Austria and switched to keeping a political diary with a committed reference to Austria, behind which artistic activity took a back seat.

During the Second World War he was drafted and assigned to look after prisoners of war in Styria . In 1945 he married Elfriede Hainzl from Graz and settled in Graz. In the post-war years he made a contribution to adult education in Styria through numerous activities . 1964-69 he held a teaching position for artistic design at the Graz University of Technology and also began to paint again himself.

Works (selection)

• Standing Nude, 1922, charcoal, pencil / paper, Vienna, University of Applied Arts, Bethusy Collection.
• Portrait of Georg Schaukal, 1923, oil / cardboard, Graz, Neue Galerie.

Literature (selection)

• Wilfried Skreiner: Wolfgang Schaukal 1900-1981. Paintings and graphics , Graz 1982.
• Wolfgang Schaukal (1900-1981) . Exhibition cat. Austrian Gallery Belvedere, Vienna 1991.
• Johann Wolfgang von Schaukal and the Noetscher Circle . Anonymous, undated typescript from the possession of Schaukal's descendants, Vienna, University of Applied Arts, Bethusy Collection; quoted in: Edwin Lachnit: Wrestling with the angel. Anton Kolig - Franz Wiegele - Sebastian Isepp - Gerhart Frankl , Vienna-Cologne-Weimar 1998.

Web links

• Literature by and about Johann Wolfgang Schaukal in the catalog of the German National Library