Hans Fronius - Buy or sell works
12 September 1903, Sarajevo (Bosnia) - 21 March 1988, Mödling (Austria)
Hans Fronius is an important proponent of Austrian Expressionism and, along with Alfred Kubin, one of Austria’s most important graphic artists and illustrators.
At age 11, Fronius witnessed the assassination of the Austrian heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, in Sarajevo. This was a formative experience for the artist. He spent his school years in Graz, where the family settled after WWI before joining the Vienna Academy.
Even at this stage, literary works served as the inspiration for his art. He was the first illustrator of Franz Kafka’s works, and close friends with Alfred Kubin. During his three decades as a professor of art in Fürstenfeld in Styria, he travelled Europe extensively. In 1943 Fronius joined the Wehrmacht, but his regime-critical illustrations resulted in him having to flee to Switzerland to escape the Nazis until the end of the war. In the early 1960s, he moved with his family from Styria to settle near Vienna.
His works in chalk, ink, with pencil, brush, wooden stylus, his pen drawings, woodcuts and lithographs, all primarily served to illustrate literary themes. He illustrated 115 books including works by William Shakespeare, Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky, Edgar Allan Poe, Honoré de Balzac, as well as Stefan Zweig, Georg Trakl, Hugo von Hoffmannsthal, Hans Christian Andersen and others. His range of subject matter extended from portraits, depictions of nature, and vedute, as well as illustrations. His works often focussed on spiritual matters, with a particularly notable Stations of the Cross painted on glass in the church at Thörl. Painting, lithography and etching remained his preferred disciplines.
Fronius’s style is distinguished by its narrative power and the spontaneity of the gestures which are frequently described as ‘expressive realism’. Goya, Ensor and Kubin are his artistic role models, with his works for Franz Kafka typical of the dark and metaphysical nature of his art.
Works by Hans Fronius can be found in many Austrian as well as international museums. Numerous exhibitions around the world have been dedicated to his work. He received many awards, including the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art.