Football Championship - Austria / II. Republic of Austria 2008 - 55 Euro Cent

In keeping with the theme of the UEFA EURO 2008 ™ year, Austrian Post, in collaboration with the Essl Museum, has published this image of Maria Lassnig as a special stamp. The painter from Carinthia is one of the most important contemporary artists and has received international attention with her "Körpergefühlsmalerei". In the center of the extensive work of Maria Lassnig stands the observation of the "body feeling" through the medium of the classical painting. Metamorphoses and merging of bodies with lifeless machines - similar to the Surrealists, reflections on flora and fauna as well as mythological and existential themes, motifs from the experience and the outside world - meet us in their pictures. In later works, her figures are no longer embedded in the pictorial space, yet they appear light, extremely spontaneous, lively and expressive; the canvas remains white, untreated, and recessed in addition to the figures. The image on the brand, created in 2000, is an example of this. The original can be viewed from February to May 2008 as part of the exhibition "From Baselitz to Lassnig" in the Essl Museum, 3400 Klosterneuburg. Born in Kappel am Krappfeld on 8 September 1919, the artist began studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna in 1941, but had to leave her because her pictures were considered "degenerate". She continued her studies with Ferdinand Andri and Herbert Boeckl. After graduating in 1945, she returned to Klagenfurt. In 1951 she moved back to Vienna. A Paris scholarship in the same year and another stay in 1952 brought her into contact with the surrealists. Only in 1954 she returned to the Academy of Fine Arts and graduated in the class Albert Paris Gütersloh from their academic education. She belonged to the circle around Monsignor Otto Mauer and applies - together with Arnulf Rainer - as the founder of informal painting in Austria. In the 1960s, she lived mainly in Paris and New York, where she also dealt with the cartoon and produced their own short films. In 1980 she accepted the call to the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. She was the first woman in German-speaking countries to take up a professorship for painting. Together with VALIE EXPORT, she represented Austria at the Venice Biennale and later exhibited her own works at Documenta in Kassel. Maria Lassnig has received several awards for her painterly work. She was the first artist to receive the Austrian State Prize in 1988 and was honored with the Oskar Kokoschka Prize one year later. In 2004, she received the highly endowed Max Beckmann Prize of the city of Frankfurt for her outstanding achievements. In 2005, the Federal President awarded her the decoration for science and art.