Bruno Gironcoli - vendere e comprare opere
27 September 1936, Villach (Austria) - 19 February 2010, Vienna (Austria)
Bruno Gironcoli was an Austrian painter and sculptor who is primarily known for his monumental sculptures.
Born in Villach in 1936, Gironcoli first trained as a goldsmith, silversmith and coppersmith in Innsbruck before starting his studies to be a painter at the Academy of Applied Arts in Vienna in 1957, under the direction of Eduard Bäumer. He spent one year in Paris, where he busied himself with works by Alberto Giacometti, and, by extension, with the ways in which the human form could be depicted. After returning to Vienna he attended the metalworking class run by Eugen Meier at the Academy of Applied Arts. Gironcoli had his first solo exhibition in 1967, at the Galerie Hildebrand in Klagenfurt. The year after, Gironcoli took part in the “Super Design” group exhibition, alongside colleagues including Roland Goeschl, Hans Hollein, Oswald Oberhuber and Walter Pichler.
His understanding of sculpture changed fundamentally at the end of the 1960s: he created action spaces using everyday items, broaching the issues of interpersonal relations and violence in various forms.
The artist represented Austria at the Biennale in Sao Paolo in 1971. In 1977, he replaced Fritz Wotruba as Professor and Head of the Masterclass in Sculpture at Vienna’s Academy of Fine Arts. This enabled him to expand his studio and be independent of the art market.
He created sculptures of monumental scale from the mid-1980s onwards. In addition to inclusion in numerous exhibitions both in Austria and abroad, Gironcoli also won several awards, including the 1993 Grand Austrian State Prize.
The Gironcoli Museum in the park of Herberstein Castle holds the largest collection of the artist’s work.
The artist died in Vienna in February 2010, after a long illness. A 2018 retrospective in mumok is the first to focus on Gironcoli’s paintings and drawings: these pages are no less important within the artist’s oeuvre.
Bruno Gironcoli’s works have enjoyed success at Dorotheum auctions for a few years now. On 2 June 2016, his work “Begegnung” from 1968/69 (no. 2 of 6 casts) sold for € 25,000 at a Contemporary Art auction.