Norbert Drexel

Norbert Drexel was born in Hohenems in 1933 and moved to Innsbruck in 1940, where he first proved his artistic ability at the Toni Kirchmayr school of drawing and painting. From 1950 to 1957 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna in the master class of Prof. Josef Dobrowsky, emerging from it as a freelance and up-and-coming artist. His pictures, peaceful enough in themselves, always carry macabre features whose primary aim appears to be capturing the light of the moment. Just as characteristic are the smoky modulations of colour that cause the outlines of every figure to blur. Norbert Drexel received numerous prizes, among them the Academy’s master school prize in 1954/56 and the Theodor Körner Award in 1963.

Richard Kurt Fischer

Anyone who has ever tried their hand at watercolour painting, which is only possible while the paint is wet and therefore within a very tight window of time, knows what an incredible talent Richard Kurt Fischer possessed. He is regarded as the creator of the two extra-large watercolours in the rear area of the coffee house and was an out-and-out horse enthusiast. Besides several horse studies on display in the Café Central cherry room, it is above all his “Horse with Breasts” in the hotel breakfast room that catches the eye, uniting his watercolour artistry with his weakness for horses in a single work. One of his most famous works is known to every festival visitor in Salzburg, where his horse mosaic adorns the entrance to the Festspielhaus. Unjustly underrated, this pupil of Oskar Kokoschka attended the state technical school in Innsbruck from 1936 to 1939 and, during his studies at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and on his many trips abroad, always remained a welcome guest at the Café Central.

Paul Flora

A true master of his craft was the Tyrolean draughtsman, caricaturist, graphic artist, illustrator and writer Paul Flora, to whom we likewise devote an entire floor of the Hotel Central. His “nervous storms of line”, carefully composed through lithography, etching and pen and pencil drawing, mostly show rather melancholy and sombre motifs, which did nothing to harm his popularity. Quite the opposite. Paul Flora was always very proud that his works hung less in museums than in living rooms, which made him a widely known artist far beyond the borders of Tyrol. This exceptional Innsbruck artist, who lived on the Hungerburg, was a frequent guest at the Café Central during his lifetime and is still regarded by many Tyroleans as a defining artist of the Alpine region.

Dietmar Kainrath

Before Dietmar Kainrath refined his pointed and remarkably apt views of the world into art through caricatures and cartoons, he worked as a freelance commercial graphic artist in Tyrol. His countless drawings on the subjects of Tyrol, justice, politics, addiction and sport were well known to a broad public for decades. The caricatures he produced for the drinks brand Red Bull are unforgettable too. Kainrath’s unmistakable line and the many national and international publications of his work made him known far beyond the region’s borders and a fixture among caricaturists. The Central is particularly pleased about the large number of works that revolved around the coffee house, and mourns the recently deceased Dietmar Kainrath, who often and gladly drew his inspiration from a long visit to the Café Central.

Renate Krauss

Born in Innsbruck in 1935, the freelance painter Renate Krauss learned her craft at the state technical school in Innsbruck before attending the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. Her pastels in particular deserve closer mention, and of these her work “Trees and Benches”, created in 1976, hangs in the Café Central. Renate Krauss made a name for herself with still lifes, landscapes and self-portraits in every technique, and in her later creative period turned to an ever more expressive use of colour. In doing so she was not concerned with a realistic rendering of nature but followed her feeling and her spontaneity instead.

Oswald Oberhuber

Oswald Oberhuber’s creative repertoire is hard to put into words and ranges from painting to sculpture and the conceptual development of art in general and in the very particular. As a grand seigneur of postmodernism and a “bedrock” figure of the Austrian art scene, Oberhuber influences artists from all over the world and regards avoiding a uniform style as the highest goal for any artist. Professor, exhibition maker, gallery director, thoroughbred artist and twice rector of the University of Applied Arts Vienna, he is considered a conceptual artist from the very first hour, is an honorary senator of the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart and holds the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art.

Rudi Wach

Born in Hall in Tirol and raised in Thaur, the Tyrolean artist Rudi Wach is a sculptor and a draughtsman in equal measure. In both disciplines he has always committed himself to shaping creatures, letting beings rise up out of deep chasms and merge into creative bodies that cannot be categorised without contradiction. Animal or human, horse or goat, again and again Wach plays with proportions, fragments and expectations through an artistic X-ray gaze, inventing figures that are mirrored just as well in nervously branching pencil strokes as in roughly agitated plaster modelling.

Martin Gostner

Martin Gostner’s works reflect his interest in the history of things. Another system of thought that characterises Gostner’s work is continually developed further under the term bay-window culture. Gostner brings the bay window to the fore as a hybrid space standing for the connection of two worlds, an inner and an outer one. The bay window as a place where you come to rest and can reflect, which allows a safe view out onto the world and where important experiences are gathered. Almost a description of the Café Central itself. Which brings us to this: at first glance the café also stands godfather to a very special work by Gostner that hangs in our coffee house. But the effect of the deeply snow-covered coffee house was produced with cotton wool, one of Gostner’s favourite means of expression.

Max Weiler

Born in Absam in 1910, Max Weiler was an Austrian painter who shaped both style and era and whose works achieved worldwide renown. Up to his death in 2001 his portfolio comprised some 1,600 paintings and 3,500 drawings, which brought him numerous prizes, honours and awards at national and international level. Max Weiler became known to the wider public above all through his large-format works in public spaces. The Hotel Café Central pays homage to this great Tyrolean artist too, with numerous works that can be admired on an entire floor of the hotel. Like many other artists, Max Weiler was glad to visit the Café Central whenever his time allowed and enjoyed the inspiring atmosphere of the coffee house.