Painter used ‘informal’ style

Josef Mikl, 78, a painter whose abstract works helped rehabilitate Nazi-ravaged Austria’s visual arts scene, died of cancer March 29 in Vienna.

Mikl was considered among the most important Austrian representatives of the “informal” style, with a wide range of expression exhibited in works that spanned more than half a century.

Beyond the artistic value of his creations, his abstract paintings and sculptures helped define Austria’s postwar art direction, serving as a symbolic break with the strictures imposed by the Nazis that consigned Picasso, Matisse, Chagall and other modernists to the trash heap.

Mikl’s methods of expression reflected his multifaceted talent: works in oil, pastels and water colors, as well as sculptures and drawings that either stood alone or served as book illustrations or church decorations.

Perhaps his most monumental work was the renovation of the “Redoutensaal” -- a massive hall of Vienna’s Imperial Palace -- after a 1992 fire.

Born Aug. 8, 1929, in Vienna, Mikl attended an art school in the Austrian capital before studying with painter Josef Dobrowsky at the Academy of Creative Arts.

He was part of the Vienna Art Club and later the Galerie St. Stephan group. In 1968, he represented Austria at the 34th Biennale in Venice.

Nine years later, he participated in the documenta 6 exhibition of contemporary and experimental art in Kassel, Germany.