Willi Helfert

Willi Helfert

Wilhelm "Willi" Helfert , also Willy Helfert , (born November 26, 1922 in Judenau-Baumgarten , Lower Austria , † May 23, 1991 in Vienna ) was an Austrian painter and graphic artist.

Life

Self-portrait, oil

Blast furnace tapping at Vöest, oil

Etching from the cycle "Glück auf"

Willi Helfert was drafted into the military in 1940 immediately after graduating from high school in Vienna and trained as a radio operator by the Air Force. After his return from English captivity, he worked as a radio telegraphist for Radio Austria AG and studied theater studies, art history and philosophy at the University of Vienna; Due to illness, he had to drop out of the course.

Johann Muschik , a colleague at the time and later a cultural journalist, encourages him to continue to occupy himself with art: at the age of 32, Willi Helfert began to draw and paint as an autodidact. In 1956 he took part in the International Summer Academy in Salzburg, where he learned from Oskar Kokoschka ("School of Seeing"). He recommended him as a student to Georg Eisler , who in turn had been tutored by Kokoschka: “Dear Georg, you devil, help my dear Willi Helfert, who will draw and paint for you! You are one of my loyal friends and at the same time you are well on your way to becoming an artist. Where else could Willi learn something ?! All the best, OK ” . Helfert worked for many years in Eisler's studio, and the initial teacher-student relationship resulted in a lifelong friendship.

The increasing successes as a painter and graphic artist prompted Willi Helfert to give up his very well paid job as a radio telegraphist in 1970 and to work as a freelance artist. The works from the 1960s and 1970s show still lifes, nudes, portraits, landscapes and gradually concentrated on the Viennese cityscape (solo exhibitions in the Yppen, Alte Schmiede, Vienna Secession, E. Hilger galleries, among others).

The growing interest in the industrial landscape led Helfert to VÖEST in Linz in 1978 , where he was given access to the blast furnace. At the same time he got to know another world of work that was alien to him in the coal mine of the market town of Ampflwang: “It was the polarity of these two worlds of work that grabbed me. Here the extreme darkness, there the compelling, glistening light of the liquid steel. Here the narrowness of the room, the feeling of being locked in, there the huge halls, the enormous technology that degrades people to a minority. Despite all the differences, both working environments have something in common. Both are extraordinary, both more dangerous than others. "

The artistic implementation of this fascination resulted in an extensive cycle of images “Light and Dark - Images from Steelworks and Mines”, which was supported by the Austrian Chamber of Labor (AK) and presented to the public for the first time at AK Vienna; Exhibitions of the cycle all over Austria followed.

Another engagement with the subject of mining and heavy industry was initiated in 1987 by the invitation of the Ruhr Festival to Dortmund, the seat of important steel and mining companies; The resulting pictures were first exhibited at the Ruhr Festival in Recklinghausen. As a result, Helfert's works related to the world of work were found at the major art fairs in Basel, Düsseldorf and Cologne. In 2006 the Upper Austrian provincial exhibition "Coal and Steam" in Ampflwang presented his pictures of the local coal mine.

The great media response established Willi Helfert's reputation as an Austrian industrial, mining and work painter and as such he was invited to group exhibitions in Argentina, Australia, Bulgaria, Germany, GDR, Israel, Yugoslavia, the former USSR and the USA .

Although this subject is primarily associated with Helfert's, in some cases, large-format, densely painted oil paintings, a lot of graphics were also created: sketches quickly thrown on the spot served as a memory aid, but he also has his impressions in powerful drawings and in the etching cycle "Glück auf" (Etching workshop Zein 1978). This was shown at the Ruhr Festival and in the Upper Austrian State Exhibition, but it never went on sale.

Only a few works by Willi Helfert are in the public hands ( Federal Ministry for Education, Art and Culture , Museum Niederösterreich , Kulturamt der Stadt Wien, Albertina , Wien Museum ), most of them were bought by private persons or institutions at home and abroad . According to contemporary witnesses, this was not least due to Helfert himself: he avoided media appearances and was reluctant to seek contacts with decision-makers in the public sector for any purchases; Self-marketing, let alone profit maximization, was alien to him. Nevertheless, he received several awards for his work.

In his later years Willi Helfert worked as an enthusiastic and enthusiastic teacher: he led painting and drawing courses at the Vienna adult education centers and gave lectures on art in AK culture seminars.

Awards

• 1974 Theodor Körner Prize
• 1976 work grant from the city of Vienna
• 1988 Gold Medal of Merit of the City of Vienna

swell

• Hannes Etzelstorfer: From fascination to fear - Willi Helfert's artistic path to becoming a mining and steelworks painter. In: Cat. On the Upper Austrian State Exhibition 2006. Trauner Verlag, Linz
• Gerhard Habarta: Earlier conditions . Art in Vienna after 1945, Vienna 1966
• Cat. Work and Rhythm (exhibition of the Kunsthalle Recklinghausen on the occasion of the Ruhrfestspiele Recklinghausen '87), Herten 1987
• Cat. Art & Work (exhibition by the Neue Berliner Galerie in the Altes Museum, Berlin and in the Austria House Palais Palffy, Vienna), Horn 1987
• Kat. Willi Helfert, light and dark . Pictures from steelworks and mines (exhibition of the Chamber for Workers and Employees for Vienna - text and editing by Friederike Stadlmann), Vienna 1979
• Robert Sterk and Fritz Hans Wendl (eds.): Newspaper sheets . Artists draw for today (texts: Heinz. R. Unger), Vienna 1981.

The image material comes from the estate of Willi Helfert.