The Painted Cafe

By Andrew Judd

A personal journal of my experiences painting in the cafes of Vienna Austria. This book is illustrated with 33 full colour images.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Mar 29, 2011
• ISBN: 9781257227402

Andrew Judd

Andrew Judd (PhD, Sydney University) is lecturer in Old Testament at Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. He teaches Old Testament, hermeneutics, and biblical theology. His PhD on biblical hermeneutics focused on Hans-Georg Gadamer’s phenomenology of play, Christian interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures, and why smart people seem to keep disagreeing on what the Bible means. An ordained Anglican minister, Andrew has served in pastoral ministry as a preacher and pastor for the last 10 years.?

Book preview

life.

INTRODUCTION

This book covers a period of approximately two-and-a-half years and encompasses a time when I made important strides as a man and as an artist while living and working in Vienna, Austria.

My wife, Renu, was offered a job there and we both viewed it as an opportunity to fulfill a long-standing dream of living on the European continent and discovering another way of life. Renu gave me the freedom to follow my heart as an artist, to develop my potential personally and professionally. I will always be indebted to Renu because without her support, both financially and emotionally, I wouldn’t have made this journey.

Vienna is a diverse and beautiful city with an abundance of visual opportunities. What a place to paint! And, that is exactly what I did—almost incessantly. I managed to produce over 250 works in my time there. These paintings ranged in size from 9 x 12 inches up to 5 x 6 feet.

The art scene in Vienna is very much alive and art is appreciated by the general populace. Coming from Canada, where I almost feel apologetic for making my living in this manner, to a culture that admires and celebrates artists was a kind of culture shock, but in the most positive way. The galleries are everywhere and cater to young and old alike. Contemporary art shares wall space with the old masters. There is a very interesting marriage of old and new throughout the city in almost every aspect. Many ancient buildings have ultra-modern additions built in ways that highlight and accentuate the beauty of the past. Mirrored facades reflect the old stone and brick of the past while skylights invite the light of day into formerly gloomy rooms.

For an architect, musician, writer, or painter, Vienna, in its own special way, provides a stage for showcasing talent, feeding the artist’s insatiable appetite for inspiration and revelation.

I stood in wonder in front of Gustav Klimt’s The Kiss; my jaw dropped when I saw the stunning drawings and paintings Schiele produced in his short life; I listened to Mozart in the 250th anniversary year of his death in the same city he’d performed it so long ago. I walked along the same street Freud had walked every day and through the great palaces of the Hapsburg Empire.

The magic of this place is everywhere and yet there is another side to Vienna too.

Austria’s dark secrets aren’t far beneath the surface. Police patrol the Jewish quarter in the first district and provide an extra level of security. Austria’s involvement in the Second World War and