RUDOLF KEDL* (Stadtschleining 1928 - 1991 Markt Neuhodis)
Abstracted columns, 1980
bronze relief, 15,5 x 44,5 cm
signed Kedl, dated 1980

ESTIMATE € 400 - 800
STARTING PRICE € 400

From 1943 to 1945, Rudolf Kedl completed an apprenticeship as a silversmith and metal sculptor in Berndorf. From 1946 to 1949, he attended the Fachschulklasse fuer Gold- und Silberschmiede, Guertler und Ziseleure an der Bundeslehranstalt fuer das Baufach und Kunstgewerbe (technical school class for gold and silversmiths, belters and chasers at the Federal Training Institute for Construction and Applied Arts) in Graz. There he was a student of Georg Sieder, Alfred Wickenburg and Rudolf Szyszkowitz. He then studied from 1949 to 1954 at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, where he completed the master school of sculpture with Fritz Wotruba. After studying, he traveled to Italy, Greece and France. Inspired by nature, Kedl created fully sculptural and relief-like copper sculptures as well as small and large sculptures made of bronze or stone, especially amber serpentine. From the 1950s onwards, slender column-like sculptures were created, and from the 1960s onwards also compact figures. In 1954, Kedl, together with Karl Prantl and Feri Zotter, had a highly acclaimed exhibition in the orangery of Esterházy Castle in Eisenstadt. He and Prantl worked in a studio in the Orangery from 1955 to 1957. In 1956 Kedl, Prantl and Rudolf Klaudus founded the “Burgenland Artists Group”. In 1958 Kedl moved into a studio in Vienna-Meidling. In 1967, the year their son, the later sculptor Talos Kedl, was born, Rudolf Kedl and his wife, the painter Christine Elefant-Kedl, bought a property in Markt Neuhodis. Four years later, in 1971, they moved into a house there. The park was used for cultural events, as a watercolour gallery for Christine Elefant-Kedl, and as a sculpture park for Talos and Rudolf Kedl. In 1966 and 1976, Kedl represented Austria at the Biennale di Venezia. From 1966, he was a member of the Freemason Lodge “Libertas Gemina”, in 1970 a founding member of the Lodge "Libertas Oriens" and an honorary member of the Lodge “Die Bruecke”. In 1979 he was one of the co-founders of the Burgenland Cultural Offensive; He was its president until 1985. From 1986 until his death in 1991, Kedl taught as a professor of plastic design at the Graz University of Technology. Awards: Theodor-Koerner Prize, 1957; Prize of the City of Vienna for Fine Arts for Sculpture, 1969; Culture Prize of the State of Burgenland, 1983. Important works: Fountain on the Anger in Markt St. Martin, 1960; Altar as copper work in the memorial chapel of the Mogersdorf memorial, 1965; Leoben train station (facade and relief frieze), 1975; Sculpture “Hymn to Nature” in the Per-Albin-Hansson-Siedlung Ost, 1977; Sculpture "Europe" in the park in front of the Palace of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, donated by the Republic of Austria, 1986.

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