Fuchs, Ernst (1930-2015), Flora Okuli, 1975

Ernst Fuchs(1930 Vienna - 2015 Vienna), Flora Okuli , 1975. Colour etching in reddish brown, 24 x 16.5 cm (image), 41 x 29.5 cm (sheet size), inscribed on the plate: "Flora Okuli from this plate 10.000 copies were printed. Ernst Fuchs", 1975. Signed by hand with pencil "[Ernst] Fuchs" on the right below the image and numbered by hand "1009" on the left. Catalogue raisonné Hartmann/Weis no. 224.

- a little bit shaded due to the former framing, otherwise a good and strong impression

- Allegorical Eyes –

According to the nomenclature of a botanical tablet, the graphic has a Latin name for what is depicted here: 'Flora Okuli' or 'Eye Flower'. However, the flower does not look like a flower, but rather has a female form and is therefore also Flora, the goddess of blossom and fertility. Ernst Fuchs gives her a densely haired, bird-like head, which - turned into profile - looks at us with one eye. She also holds in one hand a shield in the form of a face with oversized eyes, and in the other a kind of shield which, as a whole, seems to be an eye.

The goddess of fertile, blossoming nature is herself completely eye and thus an allegory of the sense of sight, which respects nature as an aesthetic appearance and enjoys its work as a work of art. This is the link between nature and art that is central to Ernst Fuchs' virtuoso iconographic recreation. It is, after all, an image that stands for art in general and graphic art in particular, which was included in the special edition of Walter Koschatzky's Die Kunst der Graphik.

About the artist

The young Ernst Fuchs chose as his baptismal name 'Ernst Peter Paul', an homage by the then twelve-year-old to Peter Paul Rubens, who would continue to inspire him. He received his first art lessons from his godmother's brother, Alois Schiemann. Later he attended the St. Anna School of Painting in Vienna, and in 1946 he was admitted to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, where he studied until 1950 under Robin Andersen and Albert Paris Gütersloh, the intellectual father of the Viennese School of Fantastic Realism. After travelling extensively, Fuchs spent time at the Dormition Monastery on Mount Zion in Israel, where he became deeply involved in the iconography and spiritual painting techniques that influenced him. In his book Architectura Caelestis (1966), he states that many of his motif discoveries are based on visionary experiences, which he later emphasised:

“It is not uncommon for me to go into a trance while painting, my consciousness fading in favour of a medial suspended state in which I feel guided and moved by a sure hand, doing things of which I have little conscious knowledge. This state can sometimes last for several hours. Afterwards, everything I have created in this state seems to me as if someone else had done it.”

- Ernst Fuchs

In 1962 Fuchs returned to Vienna, was appointed professor at the Academy and became probably the most influential protagonist of the Viennese School of Fantastic Realism, which had presented its first group exhibition at the Belvedere in 1959. Apart from Ernst Fuchs, Arik Brauer, Rudolf Hausner, Anton Lehmden, Helmut Leherb and Gütersloh's son Wolfgang Hutter were the main representatives of this artistic movement.

In 1972 Fuchs acquired the Otto Wagner Villa, which he turned into his private museum in a congenial continuation of Viennese Art Nouveau. The 1970s also saw the development of an artistic friendship with Salvator Dalí and Arno Breker, which Dalí summed up in 1975 with the words: "We are the golden triangle of art: Breker-Dalí-Fuchs. You can rotate us any way you like, we are always on top".

Fuchs also confirmed himself as a singer of spiritual poetry and, from the 1990s onwards, devoted himself increasingly to his fantastic architecture. The idea of a total work of art that he pursued in the Otto Wagner Villa was also reflected in the design of everyday objects. A BMW 635 CSi, for example, became a "fire fox on a hare hunt" according to his design, and the Rosenthal porcelain factory produced numerous products based on his designs.

In his art, Ernst Fuchs draws from the abundance of tradition, from which his genius gives birth to a completely new semantics:

“Insights haunt me that I had not hoped to find. Grasped by this spirituality, I also understand what the great insights of other painters were that aroused my admiration. An understanding of art and the knowledge it conveys grips me, as if my mind had entered into a discourse with all artists of all epochs.”

- Ernst Fuchs

Selected Bibliography

Source texts

Ernst Fuchs: Architectura Caelestis - Images Of The Hidden Prime Of Styles (Die Bilder des verschollenen Stils), Frankfurt a. M. 1966.

ders.: Im Zeichen der Sphinx. Schriften und Bilder. Hrsg. v. Walter Schurian, München 1978.

ders.: Aura. Ein Märchen der Sehnsucht, München 1981.

ders.: Phantastisches Leben. Erinnerungen, Berlin 2001.

Catalog raisonné

Helmut Weis: Ernst Fuchs. Das graphische Werk. 1967 - 1980, München 1980.

Literature

Gerhard Habarta: Ernst Fuchs. Das Einhorn zwischen den Brüsten der Sphinx. Eine Biographie, Graz 2001.

Friedrich Haider (Hrsg.): Ernst Fuchs. Zeichnungen und Graphik aus der frühen Schaffensperiode mit Hinweisen auf die Malerei 1942-1959, Wien 2003.

Agnes Husslein-Arco (Hrsg.): Phantastischer Realismus. Arik Brauer, Ernst Fuchs, Rudolf Hausner, Wolfgang Hutter, Wien 2008.