Paul Rotterdam

Paul Rotterdam (* 1939 in Wiener Neustadt, actually Werner Paul Zwietnig -Rotterdam ) is an Austrian painter.

Life

Paul Rotterdam spent his childhood in Leoben and in the bombing severely affected Wiener Neustadt. After high school in Leoben, he went to Vienna to prove to courses at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. At the University of Vienna Rotterdam studied philosophy from 1960 to 1966, where he in his dissertation dealt with the visual theories.

In 1965 he represented Austria at the Biennale of young artists in Paris and at the Biennale in Tokyo. Several solo exhibitions in Florence, Graz and Vienna followed. In 1967 he married his first wife Heidrun Vogelsberg, their daughter Charlotte was born in 1969.

1968 Rotterdam was appointed as associate professor at the Visual Art Center at Harvard University in Cambridge. In 1975, he was also a visiting professor at the Cooper Union School of Art in New York City. After a creative period in Paris in 1977 with exhibitions in the galleries Piltzer and Maeght, he published a book of drawings and texts by Kenneth choice.

In 1979 Paul Rotterdam a one-year visiting professorship at the University of Texas at San Antonio, where he also published along with Alvin Martin the book " Fourteen Stations of the Cross". In the same year also ends his marriage to Heidrum Vogelsberg.

Since 1973, Paul Rotterdam lived in a loft on West Broadway, New York. In the spring semester, he taught at Harvard University. After the end of his teaching career in 1987, he retired to a farm in North Blenheim, New York, where he works in his studio.

1986/87 under the artist takes numerous trips to the copper printing workshop of Rolf Meier in Winterthur, and illustrated " The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge " by Rainer Maria Rilke. 1994/95 is Paul Rotterdam to Vienna, where he holds in the Spring semesters 14 lectures at the Academy of Fine Arts.

1996 married Paul Rotterdam painter Rebecca Littlejohn.

Rotterdam visited annually for a few weeks Austria, lectures, enjoys it to speak German again and is a regular conductor of an artists' retreat, which meets annually in the summer for two weeks in the Benedictine Abbey Seckau to rest, silence and reflection.

Paul Rotterdam has an extensive collection of African masks.

Style

His paintings are abstract objects, mostly monochrome or reduced in color. Physical forms range from the screen in the room.

The art critic Dore Ashton writes about his style:

"His idea of ​​the mission of the painter is similar to the statement of Rilke in a letter to his wife, that reality is not to remain within dreams, intentions or moods is, but their implementation in real things. Rotterdam is a modern painter (though he doubts its modernity and she denies sometimes even provocative ) with images that represent closed, physical entities in themselves. He is forced to put his strong feelings in things. "

From about 1980 his minimalist style is wider and include more and more forms of nature with a:

"His new work is concerned still with cosmic expanse, but now at the level of the romantic notion of the sublime. His metaphysical fusion of earth, plants, water and sky, punctuated by references to ephemeral, man-made things or myths and represents for him the eternal unity not only between man and nature, but also of past, present and future ". "

"Garden ", 2006, Acrylic on canvas, 244 x 155 cm

" Night", 1996, graphite on paper, 88 x 567 cm

Awards

• 2007 Culture Prize of the city of Leoben
• In 2007 he was awarded the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art.

Exhibitions

Rotterdam images can be found at the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum and the Albertina. He had also exhibited in numerous galleries and museums in the U.S., Europe and Japan Solo Exhibitions:

Publications

• Paul Rotterdam. Exhibition in 1965. Catalog, Galerie im Griechenbeisl, 1965.
• Carl Aigner (ed.): Paul Zwietnig -Rotterdam. Worklist. painting, sculpture, projects. List. Painting - sculpture projects. From 1953 to 2004. With essays by Dore Ashton, Paul Konrad Liessmann, Joachim Horse Inn, Manfred Wagner and others Prestel, Munich 2004 and 2007, ISBN 978-3-7913-3286-4.
• Carter Ratcliff: Paul Rotterdam. Selected paintings 1972-1982, Storrer edition, Zurich, 1982
• Joachim Horse Inn, Dore Ashton: Paul Zwietnig -Rotterdam. Selected works, 1969 - 1989 Edited by the cultural department of the province of Lower Austria, Vienna, 1989, ISBN 3854600054
• Kenneth choice: Paul Rotterdam: Selected drawings 1974-77, Storrer edition, Zurich, 1977, ISBN 3-85908-001- X ( ISBN formally wrong ).

Audio

• Heinz Janisch: Substance - The painter Paul Rotterdam. People images, Oct. 4, 2009.