Albin Egger-Lienz
(Stribach near Lienz (East Tyrol) 1868 - St. Justina near Bozen (South Tyrol) 1926)
Albin Egger-Lienz was born Ingenuin Albuin Trojer in the village of Stribach near Dölsach in East Tyrol. His training began with his father, the church painter and photographer Georg Egger. The young artist then went to the Munich Academy for further studies. There he met Franz von Defregger, who had a strong artistic influence. Ferdinand Hodler and Jean-François Millet were also important role models.
Albin Egger-Lienz was religiously oriented from an early age. The predominant theme of his artistic work was the hard everyday struggle of rural life, which is shaped by Catholicism.
In 1899 Egger-Lienz and his wife moved to Vienna. In 1900 he became a member of the cooperative of visual artists Vienna and was also a founding member of the Hagenbund.
For the painting "Feldsegen" he received the bronze medal at the Paris World Exhibition.
In 1902 he received the Kaiserpreis for the painting “After the Peace Treaty” and the painting was bought by the state.
In 1909 Egger-Lienz became a member of the Vienna Secession.
In 1910 the council of professors at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts proposed him as professor. However, the appointment was prevented by the heir to the throne, Franz Ferdinand, which was partly due to the artist's Secession membership. - Egger-Lienz not only had pleasant experiences as an artist in Vienna. On the one hand, his important work “Dance of Death” was created in the Danube city, which was also exhibited in the Vienna Künstlerhaus. However, the contradicting reactions resulted in the heir to the throne enacting a ban against buying the art of Egger-Lienz, whereupon the painter no longer received any public contracts.
In 1911 the artist accepted a professorship at the Grand Ducal Saxon University of Fine Arts in Weimar, which entailed another move.
In 1919 Albin Egger-Lienz was offered a professorship at the Vienna Academy, which he refused, as well as a renewed appointment in 1925.
During the First World War, Egger-Lienz was a war painter, which shaped him for the rest of his life. The coloring of his art grew darker. After the war, the color palette changed back to lighter shades. For example, he painted a dance of death picture in amber tones.
In 1918 the artist moved his permanent residence to South Tyrol, where he spent the rest of his life. In the last years of his life, Albin Egger-Lienz was made an honorary doctorate from the University of Innsbruck and an honorary citizen of the city of Lienz. In 1926 the painter died in St. Justina near Bozen.
Albin Egger-Lienz's oeuvre mainly includes religious motifs, scenes from everyday rural life, stories from the Tyrolean struggle for freedom of 1809 and general illustrations of the horrors of war. The influence of Hodler made a decisive contribution to the fact that Egger-Lienz simplified his formal language into a monumental expressionism.
