Otto Beckmann

Otto Beckmann ( born May 5, 1908 in Vladivostok, Russia, † 13 February 1997 in Vienna ) was an Austrian sculptor and a pioneer of media and computer art.

Life

The family fled to Austria in 1922, where Otto Beckmann HTL Mödling and later the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts graduated. After its completion in 1941 he became a teacher at the State School of Applied Arts Krakow.

From 1945 he lived as a freelance artist in Vienna and joined the Professional Association of Austrian Artists. In 1951 he became a member of the Vienna Secession. In 1958 he was awarded the title of Professor by the Austrian Federal President.

In 1966 he founded the ars intermedia - an early collaboration of an artist with scientists ( TU Vienna ). He participated in the International Computer Art Symposium in 1969 partly in Zagreb and one of the pioneers of media and computer art (quote Peter Weibel).

Its rich exhibition activity had 25 solo exhibitions and participation in 75 collective exhibitions, many of them abroad.

Beckmann was buried at Vienna's Central Cemetery.

Work

Artistic creation Otto Beckmann moved in the tension between mysticism and algorithm, and was of great diversity. It included paintings and sculptures, but also new forms of expression such as abstract film (1953) and the imaginary Architecture ( 1966).

His works can be found among others in the Albertina in Vienna, the German Federal Ministry for Education, the Lower Austrian Provincial Museum, the MUSA Vienna, at the Neue Galerie Graz, in the Kunsthalle Bremen, at the ZKM Karlsruhe and in several private collections. For the public space he designed mosaics on numerous Viennese residential real estate and church doors and windows for religious buildings of Robert Kramreiter.

In 2005, his son Richard the archive Otto Beckmann to work up his estate.