2023-09-23 15:44:35
Vienna/Styria (OTS) – The sculptor, architectural sculptor, set designer and teacher Gero Schwanberg died on Monday, September 18th at the age of 83. He taught at the University of Applied Arts for 30 years and, since the 1970s, has pursued a dialogic concept of art that eliminates the boundaries between “applied” and “free” art.
Gero Schwanberg was born in Styria in 1940 and, after completing an apprenticeship as a goldsmith, attended the arts and crafts school in Graz. In 1960 he moved to Vienna, where he studied painting in Albert Paris Gütersloh’s class at the Academy of Fine Arts until 1962 and sculpture under Hans Knessl at the University of Applied Arts from 1962 to 1966. From 1966 his works could be seen in exhibitions. In addition to his work as a freelance artist, Schwanberg created works on buildings, in public spaces, for film and television, buildings for the theater and the opera, but also in the landscape, overgrown with plants, buried underground.
Schwanberg worked with Hausrucker & Co, Hermann Czech and Rob Krier, and realized film structures for the directors Jean-Pierre Ponnelle (“L’Orfeo”, 1978), Götz Friedrich (“Salome”, 1974) and John Glen (“James Bond 007 – Breath of Death”, 1986) and Robert Dornhelm’s legendary film “Kronprinz Rudolf” (2005). The decades-long collaboration with the architect Hans Hollein was particularly fruitful, including the “Zen Garden” (2000) on the occasion of the 11th Architecture Biennale. MAK director Lilly Hollein said: “He was an artistic counterpart to my father in such impressive projects as the transport office at the Opernring in Vienna The Turks before Vienna in 1683-exhibition and then at Dream and reality 1985, where a tower from the Karl-Marx-Hof and a huge Klimt figure transformed the artists’ house. The tobacco leaf on the portal of the tobacconist next to the Haas Haus is also a work by Gero Schwanberg.”
Schwanberg realized projects with numerous artists, including Loys Egg and Klaus Pinter. Or around 1980 the birth bed for VALIE EXPORT (Austria Pavilion at the 39th Venice Biennale). VALIE EXPORT: “It pains me to lose such a valuable, creative person with whom I collaborated a lot artistically and constructively.” Schwanberg also maintained inspiring artistic exchanges with writers such as Ernst Jandl and Reinhard P. Gruber. In 1971, he was responsible, among other things, for the sculptural costumes for the play “Zero Zero” by Peter Turrini, realized commissioned works for the Wiener Festwochen and the Theater an der Wien, and collaborated with exhibition organizers such as Boris Podrecca and Gae Aulenti.
A significant part of his activities was the teaching of traditional and the latest sculpting techniques in his courses at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. Rector Gerald Bast: “It is sad that we have to say goodbye to a long-time teacher of applied sciences who has looked after generations of students with competence and enthusiasm.”
In 2015 Schwanberg was awarded the Republic’s Gold Medal of Honor.
Questions & Contact:
PRESS CHRISTINA WERNER PR Information, photo material on request at T + 43 1 524 96 46 – 22, M +43 699 10 48 70 72, werner@kunstpresse.at Information www.geroschwanberg.at,www.dieangewandte.at
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