Art Appreciation – July/August 2025
For the July meeting, Lynne gave a presentation on the Austrian artist, Friedensreich Hundertwasser. Lynne said she had first seen and enjoyed work by Hundertwasser when she was in Vienna on an art tour as a student. Her interest was rekindled while on holiday in New Zealand earlier this year, when she visited Whangārei where there is an arts centre designed by Hundertwasser and dedicated to his art.
Hundertwasser had a fascinating life. Born in Austria in 1928 to a Jewish mother, his early years were overshadowed by Nazi policies of persecution. After the war, he pursued his talent as an artist but largely without formal study at art school. His interest in the early 20th century artist Egon Schiele is apparent in his work in the 1940s but he soon found his own style which is characterised by vivid use of colour (especially greens), and his interest in nature and buildings. He often worked in some unconventional materials, such as using wrapping paper and found materials as backgrounds. Initially this was due to lack of money, but later it was his preference. His paintings frequently include spirals, and references to architectural features such as windows which were often represented as a shape which might easily be mistaken for a hot water bottle!
Lynne said she would not try to offer interpretations of the pictures she showed; she would just ask everyone to make a personal response to what they saw. Hundertwasser did offer some explanations for his work, but he was of the opinion that the artist’s intentions were of secondary importance to the response of the viewer. She personally enjoyed his use of vibrant colour, of sinuous lines, recurring themes, frequently displaying a zest for life and nature.
In the early 1950s, he entered the field of architecture and also worked in applied art, creating flags, stamps, coins, and posters. He travelled widely, often sailing in his boat Regentag. His travels and work took him to Japan, New Zealand, many parts of Europe, the USA and elsewhere.
Much of his work focused on his mission to improve the built environment in which people live. He strongly disliked the ‘modernist’ style of architecture which was much in vogue in the post war world. Instead, he wanted people to build their own homes, or to decorate and adapt their homes inside and out. He liked to include plants and trees in the structure of his buildings, bringing the natural world into everyone’s lives. Amongst his projects are ‘redesigns’ of stark steel, glass and concrete buildings to make them colourful and joyful parts of the townscape which are enjoyable to live and work in. One of the most famous buildings on the tourist route in New Zealand is a public lavatory!
He was an outspoken activist on environmental issues, designing posters for campaigns to save the whales, address the problem of acid rain, and conservation of water to name but a few. Composting toilets, water purification by plants, green roofs and electricity generated by solar panel and water power were features of his own house in New Zealand. After his death in 2000, he was buried in accordance with his wishes which he had expressed in his painting of 1953 “The Garden of the Happy Dead.” It was to be interred without a coffin and with a tree planted over him, so that he would give back to nature some of what he had taken during his life.
John Vick