Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch

Portrait of Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch, 1940

Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch (born August 22, 1886 in Klagenfurt , Carinthia ; † October 4, 1951 ibid) was a Moravian-Carinthian artist.

Origin, youth and education

Kraigher-Mlczoch was the son of the post office clerk Franz Mlčoch from Klein Senitz / Senička near Olmütz, Moravia and of Pauline Kraigher, who came from a merchant family who immigrated from Friuli to the Rosental in Carinthia. The family moved to Brno around 1900 . Kraigher-Mlczoch attended high schools in St. Paul / Carinthia, Olomouc and Brno. 1904–1910 he studied law at the University of Vienna. At the same time he attended Anton Nowak's (1865–1932) private painting school. In Vienna Kraigher-Mlczoch was a student of the genre painter and caricaturist Theo Zasche (1862–1922). During his studies in 1904 he became a member of the Arminia fraternity in Vienna .

During his time in Vienna, Kraigher-Mlczoch produced a series of pen drawings for magazines such as “Wiener humourist Wochenschrift” and “Die Muskete”.

In 1910 he received his doctorate in law in Vienna and entered the Austrian civil service at the financial directorate in Brno. During the First World War, in which Kraigher-Mlczoch took part as first lieutenant in the fortress artillery regiment No. 5, he married the painter Auguste Gelbert (1891–1974). From 1918 to 1925 he completed studies at the Technical University of Brno with Alfons Strnischtie in his spare time.

The 1920s and 1930s

In the twenties Kraigher-Mlczoch worked primarily as a commercial artist and caricaturist for the Prague satirical magazine "Humoristicke listy". For the Brno editorial team of the Czech humorous magazine "LUCERNA", especially in 1928, he drew a few front pages and comic picture stories.

In 1927 he took part in the autumn exhibition of the Vienna Künstlerhaus with two paintings. In the same year, the large-format oil painting "Ecce homo" was created, which was shown at the World Peace Exhibition in The Hague in 1927 and as part of a women's peace conference in Prague. The painting has been lost since 1945. In 1928, to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Czechoslovak Republic, the exhibition "Czechoslovak Art at the State Exhibition of Contemporary Culture" took place in Brno. Kraigher-Mlczoch was represented here with two paintings. At the same time the exhibition of the Moravian Art Association took place in the Brno Künstlerhaus, where, in addition to Kraigher-Mlczoch, Anton Hanak (1875–1934), Anton Kolig (1886–1950) and Karl Truppe (1887–1959) also exhibited. A series of watercolors was created on the occasion of a trip to Dalmatia in 1928.

In 1928 he married Klothilde Hawelka (1900–1989), the couple had three children. From 1928 to 1933 the family lived in Friedek-Mistek, where Kraigher-Mlczoch joined the “Kunstring Mährisch Ostrau / Witkowitz” and also exhibited there. From 1933 to 1939 the residence was Mährisch Trübau. He was a member of the Moravian Art Association in Brno and regularly participated in exhibitions. In 1935 the Künstlerhaus organized an exhibition with over 40 oil paintings, 50 watercolors and drawings. From 1939 to 1945 Kraigher-Mlczoch lived as a tax office director with his family in Neutitschein, in today's Divadelni in the house where the poet Josef Billina was born. During this time he painted landscapes from nature, pictures of horses and portraits.

Years of age in Carinthia

Fresco, 1947, in the Kreuzkirche, Rosental

After the war ended in 1945, the family moved into the historic Kraigher house in Feistritz im Rosental in southern Carinthia. In the local Kreuzkirche in 1946 the painter processed the impressions of the chaos of war in two life-size frescoes, a "Pietà" and a "Resurrection". At that time, people from the local population stood as models for this and identified themselves with the painting.

Since 1946 he was a member of the "Professional Association of Visual Artists Carinthia". In the post-war period he continued to create oil paintings and watercolors, portraits of personalities from the valley and motifs from the rural and industrial world of work. In 1950 he realized a monumental résumé painting in the auditorium of Dr. Karl Renner School in Klagenfurt.

Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch died on October 4, 1951 in his native city of Klagenfurt.

Exhibitions

• 1927 (November - December): Künstlerhaus Wien, Karlsplatz, participation in the autumn exhibition with "Spanish Dance" and "Sportsman"
• 1927 (February): Peace exhibition in The Hague, participation with "Ecce Homo"
• 1928 (June): "Czechoslovak Art at the State Exhibition of Contemporary Culture in Brno" (Československe umeni na vystave soudobe kulturny v Brne), participation with "Ecce homo" and "Spanish Dance"
• 1928 (July): “Exhibition of Sudeten German Artists” in the Künstlerhaus Brünn, Krapfengasse, participation with portraits
• 1928 - 1944: Regular participation in the spring and Christmas exhibitions of the Moravian Art Association in the Künstlerhaus Brno
• 1931: Exhibition of the Mährisch Ostrau / Witkowitz art ring, participation
• 1934: Participation in an exhibition with Silesian artists in Prague in the KJ
• 1934: Peace Congress of the “International Women's League” in Prague, painting “Ecce Homo” in the conference room
• 1935 (October - November): "Special exhibition Maxim Kopf, Prague, Otto Mlčoch, M. Trübau, Ilse POMPE, Prague, Trude Schmidl-Wähner, Vienna" in the Künstlerhaus Brünn,
• 1982 (November - December): Special exhibition "Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch 1886-1951" in the Carinthian State Gallery in Klagenfurt
• 1996 (July): Exhibition "In the footsteps of Otto Kraigher in our community" (In njegovi umetniški sledoviv nasih krajih), Slovenian cultural association KOČNA in Feistritz im Rosental / Suetschach, Gorše Gallery
• Permanent memorial exhibition "Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch1886-1951" in the gallery in the historic Kraigher house in Feistritz in the Rosental

Museum and collections

Since 1997 there has been a permanent memorial exhibition in the Kraigher-Haus in Feistritz im Rosental, Carinthia, where items on loan from the Museum Novy Jičin / Neutitschein are also shown. This museum houses a considerable collection of works by Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch. Further works can be found in the collections of the Province of Carinthia, the Ministry of Culture in Prague and privately owned in Austria and Moravia.

Prizes and awards

• 1928: Brno Artist Prize

literature

• The musket . humorous magazine, Vienna, 86/1908, 131/1908, 136/1908, 144/1908, 145/1908.
• Catalog of the autumn exhibition 1927 in the Künstlerhaus Vienna.
• Humorist Listy . Prague, 42/1927, 45/1927, 48/1927, 11/1928, 12/1928, 16/1928, 21/1928, 23/1928, 26/1928, 29/1928.
• Vystava soudobe kulturny v Brne 1928 - Čescoslovenske vytvarne umeni 1918–1928 . Catalog, Brno 1928.
• Lucerna . Brno / Brünn, no. 3/1928, 22/1928, 23/1928, 26–28 / 1928.
• Wiener Bilder , 46/1927, p. 9.
• Neue Freie Presse , Abendblatt, Vienna, November 25, 1928, p. 5.
• Viktor Oppenheimer: From our German visual artists in Moravia and Silesia . Brno 1928., pp. 11 and 16, fig. 6, 15.
• Narodny Noviny . Brno, June 21, 1928, p. 4.
• Messenger of the day Brno , Morgenblatt, December 16, 1928.
• Sbratreni , Praze / Prag v unorn, 1929, No. 4.
• Catalog special exhibition: Maxim Kopf - Prague, Dr. Otto Mlcoch - Mährisch Trübau, Ilse Pompe - Prague, Trude Schmidl-Wähner - Vienna , in the Künstlerhaus Brno, 1935.
• Toman Prokop Novy Slovnik Československych Vytvarnych Umelku . Praze / Prague 1936, 1950.
• Rainer Hening The design of the Kreuzkirche in Feistritz in the Rosental . In: Volkszeitung , Klagenfurt, August 26, 1947.
• Kleine Zeitung , for Carinthia, 14.19.1951 (obituary)
• Hugo Flögl In memoriam Dr. Otto Kraigher-Mlcoch . In: Schönhengster Heimat , Heidenheim / Brenz, No. 55/1956.
• Anton Berka: 100 years of the German fraternity in Austria - the intellectual achievement of their important men . Graz 1959.
• Miroslav Balaš: Opis z Kulturniho mistopicu v Novy Jičine . Novy Jičin / Neutitschein 1967.
• Herbert Strutz : Out and about in Carinthia . Klagenfurt 1966, p. 166.
• Helgard Kraigher The graphic work of Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch with special consideration of the portrait sketch of Hermann Hesse . In: Carinthian culture magazine Die Brücke , Klagenfurt, No. 9/1979.
• Eberhard Kraigher The sacred work of the painter Kraigher-Mlczoch . In: Yearbook 1981 of the Diocese of Gurk , Klagenfurt 1981.
• Catalog Otto Kraigher- Mlczoch 1886-1951 . Special exhibition in the Kärntner Landesgalerie, Klagenfurt 1982.
• Antonino Morocutti: Le Vetrine di Ligosullo . Edition Elite, Milano 1989, p. 67.
• Catalog In the footsteps of Otto Kraigher in our community - In njegovi umetniški sledovi v naši Krajih , exhibition Galerie Gorše, Suetschach / Feistritz 1996.
• Anton Kreuzer Carinthian Biographical Sketches . Klagenfurt 1997, p. 151.
• In memory of Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch . In: Kärntner Tageszeitung , Klagenfurt, May 25, 1997.
• Novy Jičin. A Jeho Vitvarny Umelci . Novy Jičin / Neutitschein 2006, pp. 34–43.

Web links

• Further information as well as the current program of the memorial exhibition can be found on the website of the gallery in the Kraigher House , updates can also be found on the gallery's Facebook page .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume II: Artists. Winter, Heidelberg 2018, ISBN 978-3-8253-6813-5 , pp. 418-420.
2. ↑ Otto Kraigher-Mlczoch. Retrieved October 21, 2018 . 
3. ^ Gallery in the Kraigher house. Kulturdreieck-suedkaernten.at. Retrieved October 26, 2016.