VINDOBONA ALTARPIECE III - SNAKES AND LADDERS - A Essay about this iconic drawing

This essay explores the details and the background of this iconic drawing, also exploring what led up to it, and its importance as a pivot point in my artistic development.

VINDOBONA ALTARPIECE III - SNAKES AND LADDERS - The recently made video on YouTube

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Vindobona Altarpiece III - Snakes and Ladders

^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper - 65cm x 48cm - 1994 - Private Collection, Austria}This drawing is the third in a series. It is a follow up to a diptych that I had worked on years earlier, called​ Vindobona Altarpiece I and II​. Working from right to left on both of these previous pieces (I am left handed) the first panel of this previous work was began in 1981, but not completed until 1993, whereas the second panel was started and completed already in 1980.


^{Vindobona Altarpiece I - Graphite Drawing on Paper - 76cm x 56cm - 1981 to 1993 - Private Collection Austria}These pieces had never been exhibited together. ​Vindobona Altarpiece II was bought by a collector in Austria before much of the first panel had been drawn. Eventually, ​Vindobona Altarpiece I was left unfinished in1981. I never picked it up again until 1993 when I completed it. It was then shown at my solo exhibition “Art of the Mystic” at the Prairie Art Gallery in Grande Prairie, Alberta in June 1994. Following that, I began work on​Vindobona Altarpiece III Snakes and Ladders​, which I completed the same year. It was never shown in Canada: I basically stopped exhibiting after 1996 and only began to show again in 2010, after some urging, participating in a group exhibition in Portugal with one painting. Since then, I started exhibiting regularly, both solo and in groups (​Curriculum Vitae Exhibitions​).

^{the second half of this dyptich
Vindobona Altarpiece II - Graphite Drawing on Paper - 76cm x 56cm - 1980 - Private Collection Austria}Vindobona Altarpiece II had never been shown publicly until just recently in Vienna, at the Galerie Esther by the Ernst Fuchs Museum, Exhibition Otto Rapp Fall 2024 - It was only recently that I was able to buy back this drawing from the Austrian collector. Both Number 1 and Number 3 were shown in recent years in Vienna on several occasions, and Number 3 also in Viechtach, Germany. They both found collectors.

Working on ​Vindobona Altarpiece III​ in my Studio in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada in 1994.

^{Photo by David Rositter, Lethbridge Herald Newspaper}Like in the preceding 2 pieces, the theme centers on the heritage of the​ Vienna School of Fantastic Realism​.​They are sort of a tribute to these Masters that I had admired since childhood. But also other influences were recorded, from a variety of sources, and all tied in with my own imaginary ‘Inner Universe’ (​AlfredKubin, Die Andere Seite​) that I had explored with my alter ego ​Bogomil’s Universe​.

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Some of my sources:

After a visit to the​ Maryhill Art Museum​ I was fascinated by this painting:
^{Frederic, 1st Baron Leighton of Stretton - (British, 1830–1896),​ Solitude​, 1890, oil on canvas, 72" x 36"}
I made it a central figure in my drawing.


^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper - Detail}

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I once read the book by Françoise Gilot​, ​Life with Picasso​, as well as many other books about Pablo Picasso, but this one made a particular impact on me and some funny stories in it had inspired another painting of mine some 4 years prior to this drawing, called ​Pablo’s Last Concert​. So in this drawing, I ‘recycled’ the eye of Pablo again, watching over the scene:

^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper- detail - Pablo's Eye}While in my paintings the technique of Decalcomania had been employed since the seventies, I began in this drawing to use a kneaded eraser to pick up and transfer textures to the paper, something that 2 decades later I developed further in my most recent drawings (combining it with frottage and other methods). So in a way, this marks a new period, even though that I was not very active for the next 10 years following, and only began intensive work when I returned to Austria in 2011.

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Exploring the History behind these drawings:

When I was a child, my grandfather, a very scholarly and educated man who loved art and rare books, took me to exhibitions in Vienna. Some of those were of the young artists of the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism. There was no TV or any other distractions back then: when I visited my grandfather, he always had a stack of paper and sharpened pencils ready for me. I already then entered into my solitary dream world building my own little universe in the drawings I then produced. Artists I’ve seen these days were Helmut Leherb, Ernst Fuchs, Rudolf Hausner and others I only recognized by name later, when I began my research. Later on, I would go to the Akademie der Bildenden Künste and walk the halls of the Art Collection, but also peeked into the studios and watched. Icould stand quietly for hours absorbing how a student would copy an old master in the gallery.

I left Austria, still a teenager, and moved to Sweden, and several years later to Canada. But I took my heritage with me, beginning to research in depth this fascinating Vienna School. I did not yet paint very well while I lived in Sweden, but I had always excelled in drawing. In Canada, my painting began to be more accomplished, and along with my drawing, I started to exhibit my work, which found many collectors already in the early seventies. A interest in printmaking led me to the University of Lethbridge Art Department in 1977, and while I only planned to audit some printmaking courses, I wound up taking the BFA program, eventually graduating in1982 with great distinction.

During the later years at University, I was working part time as a Gallery Assistant, and then for one year as Assistant Gallery Director in 1980. At that time, in conjunction with a new Fine Arts Building, it was proposed to open the building with an international show. Since I had already started to write a paper about the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism, I proposed to hold an exhibition. Travelling to Vienna, I contacted Prof. Rudolf Hausner​, whom I met at his residence in Mödling in 1980.

It was a memorable visit, and he loaded me down with books, catalogs and brochures about the Vienna School. Based on this information I finished and submitted my paper. It was a disappointment that my proposal for a show was not accepted by committee, but the positive outcome was a exchange of letters with Prof. Hausner, who kept sending me new material from time to time. Eventually though, the connection faded.

When years later (1995) I found out he had passed away, I was devastated. His influence on my work (and also some influence of Ernst Fuchs) was already very strong, but perhaps best illustrated by my ‘signature piece’ called ​Selfportrait with the Critical Eye from 1978, which I had shown to him on my Vienna visit in 1980. At that time, I was rather anxious about being seen as ‘derivative’, but he jovially said to me that it was ‘very good brush work’, and about the theme and composition he said something to the effect of ‘this is no great state secret - we published this (to inspire)’. Hausner, and also Fuchs, along with my earlier fascination of the Surrealists such as Max Ernst and Salvador Dali, had a recurrent presence in some of my work.

Hausner’s Adam peeked into my paintings of that day, and in my drawing took on a dominant position in this, my ultimate tribute piece to the Vienna School, Vindobona Altarpiece III where he lords it over the central portion on a dark banner that stands above the scene like a sail.


^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper
detail - Hausner's 'Adam'}As mentioned before, this drawing was not exhibited in Grande Prairie at my solo show since I only worked on it after, but a few months later, in October 1994 I entered a painted mailbox for a gallery fundraiser, titled “Rudi, schreib mal” thinking that our exchange of letters had stopped years ago. A year later, he passed away.


^{Rudi Schreib Mal​, 1994 - painted mailbox - private collection Canada}

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The Influence of Ernst Fuchs:

Of course here I would have to emphasize the considerable influence that Prof. Ernst Fuchs had on my work for as long as I can remember.
Particularly fascinating was the Unicorn series (Einhorn Zyklus) of his graphic work, particularly Die Versuchung des Einhorns. I admired his superior drawing skills above all and tried to emulate it the best I could.


^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper
(Vindobona Altarpiece III, detail, bottom right)}The inspiration for this image I found in Ernst Fuchs 1951 etching ‘Die Zeugung des Einhorns’. Drawing this image by ‘channeling’ Fuchs seemingly helped improve my skills. Of course I couldn’t help including a little selfportrait beneath the entanglement of the Unicorn with the ‘snakes'.

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Other Influences:

These drawings owe much to what I learned from studying Ernst Fuchs. The literature I received from Rudolf Hausner on the other hand acquainted me with the already larger following of the Vienna School (in the days of their break through, around 1965) and some I found particularly interesting, such as ​Karl Korab​; an image inspired by him found it’s way into the drawing as well.


^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper
Vindobona Altarpiece III - detail top right}A detail of a deformed gnome came from a Roman marble I had seen somewhere. I had utilized it before already once in an etching.


^{Graphite Drawing on Arches Etching Paper
detail Vindobona Altarpiece III}That 'gnome' is also found in another drawing called 'Family Reunion' (I am currently working on a larger version of this) and a etching 'Ultima Obscenitas Actaeonis' which is in the collection of the University of Calgary Nickle Arts Museum.

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What does it mean?

For the subtitle 'Snakes and Ladders' I found a fitting quote by Salman Rushdie.

The question remains: What does it all mean? While I had set out to make this a tribute to the Vienna School, the subtitle "​Snakes and Ladders" also alludes to the Game of Life, as in the words of Salman Rushdie (Midnight’s Children):

All games have morals; and the game of Snakes and Ladders captures, as no other activity can hope to do, the eternal truth that for every ladder you hope to climb, a snake is waiting just around the corner, and for every snake a ladder will compensate. But it's more than that; no mere carrot and stick affair; because implicit in the game is unchanging twoness of things, the duality of up against down, good against evil; the solid rationality of ladders balances the occult sinuosities of the serpent; in the opposition of staircase and cobra we can see, metaphorically, all conceivable oppositions, Alpha against Omega, father against mother. ^Source



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Final Words of wisdom and a pet concern of mine, especially about art diplomas:
I had in years past come across quite a few 'fake diplomas' that pretend to be academic credentials. Next to 'Pay to Play Galleries' they are the scourge to be avoided. The summary of a paper about this spells it out
DEGREE MILLS - THE BILLION DOLLAR INDUSTRY
^{If you google the title you will find where this book is available, but also there are many videos on this subject.}