Gabriele Baumgartner

2020

Johann Nestroy was one of the Austrian authors whom Josef Mikl greatly admired. The concept for his largest commission, the design of the Great Redoutensaal, was based on the works of Karl Kraus, Johann Nestroy, Ferdinand Raimund and Elias Canetti. His engagement with literature was also reflected in many of his works. He dedicated a cycle to the one-act play Häuptling Abendwind by Johann Nestroy, in which he artistically realized individual scenes, stage sets and characters in his own way and pursued them intensively for several years. 

During this phase of his artistic exploration, the writing of other authors also found its way into his painting. From his early years, he was accompanied by his satirical writings, which were always a connection between painting and writing or text and which he executed in notebooks, books, individual sheets or watercolors. Now, however - in the works for the Großer Redoutensaal (1994 - 1997) and the works revolving around this theme, as well as the cycle “Nestroy, Häuptling Abendwind” - the written word of others is integrated into his painting. Sometimes it is only a matter of adding the characters, other times he quotes a few lines and thus scenes.

A richly illustrated catalog “Johann Nestroy Häuptling Abendwind Vorarbeiten Bühnenentwürfe Ölbilder Graphik 1994 - 1998” has been self-published. The extensive cycle was shown in 1999 in the Austrian Theater Museum, in 1999 in the Gallery of the City of Aschaffenburg in the former Jesuit Church in Germany and in the Augustin Gallery in Innsbruck.

His admiration for Nestroy also manifested itself in the fact that since the early 1990s his studio has been located on Praterstrasse, next to Nestroyplatz.

Find more information and works on german side LINK --->