Ben Uri Research Unit

Born: 1901 Vienna, Austria-Hungary (now Austria)

Died: 1965 Vienna, Austria

Year of Migration to the UK: 1938

Other name/s: Gerhart Frankel, Gerhard Frankl, GJR Frankl

Biography

Painter and printmaker Gerhart Frankl was born in 1901 to a Jewish family in Vienna, Austria-Hungary (now Austria), son of lawyer Emil Frankl and Else Frankl (née Kohn). Frankl graduated from the Schottengymnasium and in 1919–20 took evening drawing classes at the Technische Hochschule in Vienna. In 1920–22 he spent his summers in Nötsch with the painter Anton Kolig, a family friend, meeting Wolfgang Schaukal, Bohdan Herzmansky, Sebastian Isepp and Franz Wiegele of the Nötscher Circle. In 1921, after only a brief attendance, Frankl was expelled from the Vienna School of Applied Arts (Kunstgewerbeschule). Around this time, he met Christine Büringer (1897–1985), Isepp's niece, whom he would marry in 1936. In 1923–24 he travelled to Germany, France, Belgium, and Tunisia. While in France, Frankl was profoundly moved by Paul Cézanne’s works in Auguste Pellerin’s collection. Shortly after, Frankl joined the Kunstschau artistic group and explored etching as a medium. In 1928 the Österreichische Galerie acquired Frankl's painting Still Life with Clay Pipe and his first solo exhibition opened at Galerie Caspari in Munich; Frankl also toured the Alps on his BMW motorbike, and many of his prints depict views he sketched en route. In the early 1930s, Frankl also experimented with sculpture. In 1930 the first monograph on Frankl by Hans Tietze (1880–1954) was published in conjunction with an exhibition at the Neue Galerie in Vienna. In late 1934 Frankl met one of his main supporters, Fritz Novotny (1903–1983), art historian and future director of the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere.

Following the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany, Frankl and his wife fled the country on 28 July 1938; Frankl's parents stayed and perished in the Holocaust. Immigrating to England, Frankl lectured at Morley College for Working Men and Women (1946-47), at Cambridge University, and was a Lecturer in Art at the Courtauld Institute at London University. From 1939 to 1943 he made numerous watercolour views in London, Bristol, and Berkshire, as well as studies of Old Master paintings from the British Museum collections, exhibiting his work at Walker's Galleries and the Calman Gallery, London (1938). During this time he also became friendly with influential figures such as Kenneth Clark (director of the National Gallery, 1934-1944) and fellow Austrian émigré, art historian, Ernst Gombrich. To gain extra income Frankl worked as a picture restorer in 1945–47, mainly assisting Dr Johannes Hell with the National Gallery collection. Frankl returned to Vienna in 1947, lecturing on art theory at the University of Vienna, while living in the Lower Belvedere, the accommodation arranged for the couple by Novotny, since their own apartment had been unlawfully occupied. Frankl also worked in the museum's conservation studios. The spectacular Baroque setting surrounding the palaces and the view over Vienna found expression in a series of works he created in 1947–49. Frankl applied for the post of professor at The Academy of Fine Arts and became a member of the exchange commission at the Österreichische Galerie.

Finding it difficult to resettle in Austria, Frankl and his wife returned to London in 1949. In 1950 Frankl gained British citizenship, and in 1952 he showed work in Ben Uri's annual open exhibition. In 1954 he met the émigré architect Julian Sofaer (1924–2017), who would become a great supporter of his work, future trustee of his estate, facilitator of many posthumous exhibitions, and compiler of a catalogue raisonée. Now living in Dulwich, south London, Frankl and his wife spent summers travelling through the Alps (mainly in the Dolomites and Tyrol), the landscape continuing to provide inspiration. By 1959, Frankl was working predominantly in watercolour, gouache and pastels. The Belvedere curator Kerstin Jesse commented on his Mountain Fantasies series: 'The essentially unrepresentable nature of the Alps' monumentality, mass, sublimity, and vastness, as well as the light in the mountains, which tested the limits of painting, were resolved by Frankl through dispensing with the representational to create imagery that dissolved form and was non-figurative, almost transcendental' (Agnes Husslein-Arco and K. Jesse, eds., Gerhart Frankl: Rastlos, 2015). In 1960, the first post-war UK exhibition of Frankl's works was held at the Reid Gallery in London. In 1962, the first museum retrospective was held at the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere. Frankl was awarded the City of Vienna's prize for painting in 1963.

Gerhart Frankl died unexpectedly of a heart attack in Vienna, Austria, on 25 July 1965, during a visit to confrim his election to professor at The Academy of Fine Arts. Bureaucracy had drawn out the process since 1962, and the position was now tragically unfilled. Frankl is buried at Vienna's Central Cemetery. Through Sofaer's efforts, in 1970 a Frankl retrospective was held at the Hayward Gallery, London, with Gombrich contributing to the catalogue, and in 1986 hus worked feature in the important survey show, Kunst im Exil in Grossbritannien, 1933–1945, in Berlin and London. The exhibition, Higher Ground: Prints by Gerhart Frankl (1901–65), was presented at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge in 2013. In October 2015, the Gerhart Frankl Memorial Trust donated Frankl’s works on paper to the Albertina and paintings to the Belvedere; the latter presented Masterpieces in Focus: Gerhart Frankl – Restless, in 2015. Frankl's work is represented in UK public collections, including the British Museum, Courtauld Gallery, Imperial War Museum (which holds a published version of Frankl's sketchbook, In Memoriam 1947 -1951, donated by Sofaer), and Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; New Walk Museum and Gallery, Leicester; and York Art Gallery.

Related books

Agnes Husslein-Arco and K. Jesse eds., Gerhart Frankl: Rastlos (Vienna: Belvedere, 2015)
Agnes Husslein-Arco, Wien–Paris: Van Gogh, Cezanne und Österreichs Moderne 1880–1960 (Vienna: Belvedere and Brandstätter, 2007)
Jutta Vinzent, 'List of Refugee Artists (Painters, Sculptors, and Graphic Artists) From Nazi Germany in Britain (1933–1945)' in Identity and Image: Refugee Artists from Nazi Germany in Britain (1933–1945) (Kromsdorf/Weimar: VDG Verlag, 2006), pp. 249-298
Ulrike Runeberg, 'Immigrant Picture Restorers of the German-Speaking World in England from the 1930s to the Post-War Era', in Shulamith Behr and Marian Malet eds., Arts in Exile in Britain 1933–1945: Politics and Cultural Identity (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2005) pp. 339-371
Edwin Lachnit, 'Der Nötscher Kreis', Veröffentlichungen des Tiroler Landesmuseums Ferdinandeum, No. 79, 1999, pp. 115-132
Edwin Lachnit, Ringen mit dem Engel: Anton Kolig, Franz Wiegele, Sebastian Isepp, Gerhart Frankl (Vienna: Böhlau, 1998)
Ernst H. Gombrich, Julian Sofaer and David Scrase, Gerhart Frankl, 1901–1965: Exhibition of Paintings and Works on Paper (London: Gerhart Frankl Memorial Trust, 1997)
Gerhart Frankl. Oeuvre-Katalog der Radierungen (Salzburg: Verlag Galerie Welz, 1994)
Ernst H. Gombrich, Wilfried Skreiner and Arnulf Rohsmann, Gerhart Frankl: in Memoriam (London: Wiener Library Endowment Trust, 1991)
Julian Sofaer ed., Gerhart Frankl, der Maler (Klagenfurt: Kärntner Landesgalerie, 1991)
Gerhart Frankl (1901–1965): Aquarelle, Zeichnungen, Radierungen (Salzburg: Verlag Galerie Welz, 1990)
Der Maler Gerhart Frankl (1901–1965) (Vienna: Wien Museen der Stadt, 1987)
Fritz Novotny, Gerhart Frankl (Salzburg: Verlag Galerie Welz, 1973)
E. Gombrich, 'Gerhart Frankl', Kunstkabinett, No. 3, 1971, pp. 11-13
Ernst H. Gombrich, 'Introduction', Gerhart Frankl, Paintings and Works on Paper, Hayward Gallery, London (organised by the Arts Council of Great Britain) (London: Arts Council, 1970)
Basil Taylor, 'Professor Gerhart Frankl', The Times, 5 July 1965, p. 12
Antoine Seilern ed., Gerhart Frankl (Salzburg: Galerie Welz, 1962)
Gouaches by Gerard Frankl (London: Reid Gallery, 1960)
'An Austrian Artist', The Times, 14 June 1960, p. 4
'Mr Gerhart Frankl's Drawings', The Times, 3 July, 1942, p. 7
Hans Tietze ed., Gerhart Frankl: mit einem Oeuvrekatalog der Radierungen des Künstlers (Vienna: Verlag der Neuen Galerie, 1930)

Public collections

Related organisations

Cambridge University (lecturer)
City of Vienna's prize for painting (recipient)
Courtauld Institute (lecturer)
Morley College (lecturer)
National Gallery (freelance picture restorer)
School of Applied Arts [Kunstgewerbeschule], Vienna (student)
Technische Hochschule, Vienna (student)
The Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (professor)
University of London (Lecturer in Art)

Selected exhibitions

Masterpieces in Focus: Gerhart Frankl – Restless, Upper Belvedere, Vienna (2015)
Higher Ground: Prints by Gerhart Frankl (1901–65), Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (2012)
Gerhart Frankl, 1901–1965: Ölbilder, Aquarelle, Graphik, Galerie Magnet, Vienna (2002)
Der Nötscher Kreis: Sebastian Isepp, Franz Wiegele, Anton Kolig, Gerhart Frankl, Anton Mahringer, Galerie Magnet, Vienna (2001)
Gerhart Frankl (1901–1965), Upper Belvedere, Vienna (1999)
Gerhart Frankl 1901–1965: Exhibition of Paintings and Works on Paper, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (1997)
Gerhart Frankl (1901–1965): Aquarelle, Zeichnungen, Radierungen, Galerie Welz, Salzburg (1990)
Der Maler Gerhart Frankl (1901–1965), The Vienna Museum, Vienna (1987)
Kunst im Exil in Grossbritannien, 1933–1945, Charlottenburg, Berlin (1986)
Gerhart Frankl 1901–1965: Paintings and Works on Paper, Hayward Gallery, London (1970)
Rye Art Gallery, Rye (1970)
Gerhart Frankl zum 60, Upper Belvedere, Vienna (1962)
Gouaches by Gerard Frankl, Reid Gallery, London (1960)
Museum and Art Gallery, Reading (with Friedrich Jerusalem) (1943)
Walker's Galleries, London (1942)
Paintings by Gerhard Frankl, Calman Gallery, London (1938)
Gerhard Frankl, Neuen Galerie, Vienna (1930)
Modern Austrian Painting, The Renaissance Society, University of Chicago, Chicago (1930)
Gerhart Frankl, Galerie Caspari, Munich (1928)
Summer Exhibition by Contemporary Jewish Artists, Ben Uri Gallery, London (1952)

Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Gerhart Frankl]