Hermann Nitsch valuation

Hermann Nitsch (1938–2022) was born in Vienna and trained at the Graphische Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt there from 1953, then worked as a commercial artist at the city's technical museum. He was a co-founder of Viennese Actionism, alongside Günter Brus, Otto Muehl and Rudolf Schwarzkogler, and from the end of the 1950s he developed the Orgien Mysterien Theater, a total work of art meant to engage all five senses, in which actions using blood, animal carcasses, entrails and fabric were staged with noise orchestras and scream choirs. In 1971 he acquired Prinzendorf Castle in Lower Austria, which became the setting for the largest actions, among them the Six-Day Play of 1998, and from 1971 to 1989 he taught at the Städelschule in Frankfurt. Painting ran alongside the actions, in large canvases of thrown and dripping colour, and a cycle of his pour paintings was shown at the Vienna Secession in 1987. He took part in documenta 5 and documenta 7, and museums devoted to his work opened in Mistelbach in 2007 and Naples in 2008. He lived and worked at Prinzendorf and in Asolo, in Italy.

Besides paintings on canvas there are relics from the actions, musical scores and many prints, among them lithographs issued in numbered portfolios. For a print, note the edition number, signature, publisher and printer. Poured paint can lie thickly and crack or lift, so a buyer will want to know the condition of a canvas and how it has been stored. A gallery invoice and the date of the work should go with it.