Herwig Zens

Her­wig ZENS, born on June 5, 1943 in Him­berg near Vien­na, stud­ied at the Acad­e­my of Fine Arts in Vien­na from 1961 to 1967. In his work he dealt inten­sive­ly with death, among oth­er things in the large-scale projects “Basler Toten­tanz”, the Sta­tions of the Cross in the Aus­tri­an Hos­pice in Jerusalem and the design of the bur­ial hall in Brunn am Gebirge. He also repeat­ed­ly devot­ed him­self to Greek mythol­o­gy, the work of Fran­cis­co de Goya and Spain. Start­ing in 1977, Zen’s notes began to be record­ed in his “erased diary.” On cop­per plates he record­ed dai­ly what moved him in dif­fer­ent etch­ing tech­niques. In 1995, the diary was print­ed in one piece for the first time. In 1987 Her­wig Zens was appoint­ed pro­fes­sor at the Acad­e­my of Fine Arts, where he had already held a teach­ing posi­tion since 1975. In addi­tion to his activ­i­ties at the acad­e­my, he worked inten­sive­ly on his artis­tic work. Paint­ing, along with etch­ing and draw­ing, is his main form of artis­tic expres­sion. The artist’s paint­ing style changed sig­nif­i­cant­ly dur­ing his cre­ative peri­od. In recent years, his paint­ing becomes increas­ing­ly lighter and lighter and the paint­ing draw­ing comes to the fore. In 2011 the artist was award­ed the Aus­tri­an Cross of Hon­or for Sci­ence and Art. Her­wig Zens, who left a large oeu­vre of draw­ings, etch­ings, oil paint­ings and print­mak­ing works, lived and worked in Vien­na where he dies on Sep­tem­ber 24, 2019. 1973 – first exhi­bi­tion in the gallery Welz.