RICHARD ROHAC - AUSTRIA

RICHARD ROHAC
MADE IN AUSTRIA
PERIOD/ 1950'S
ERA/ MCM
NATIVE MAN FISHING
SOLID BRONZE
RING HOLDER
New in my collection came today / the other bronze figurines are hagenauer
INFO ON ARTIST :
Richard Rohac (1906-1956) was an Austrian designer and metal craftsman. He was virtually unknown outside of Austria in his lifetime. His work was sold internationally with only his logo (and "Made in Austria") to identify its source, a common enough practice at the time. Rohac apprenticed with the Werkstätte Hagenauer Wien in Vienna as a teenager, and stayed with the workshop another nine years before opening his own metalwork business in 1932. Rohac’s career was interrupted by military service and a period of internment in Greece. On his return to Vienna, he reopened his workshop and began producing the types of household items that had been lost or destroyed during wartime bombings. When a market emerged again for decorative objects, Rohac turned his talents to the design and production of busts and sculptures, as well as everything from desk and smoking accessories to corkscrews to bookends to pretzel holders to candlesticks.

He specialized in exotic – for the 1950s – African and Asian figures, and jungle animals. Rohac’s work was featured in an American newsreel on Austrian arts and crafts; one of his African busts was a state gift from Austria to the president of Mexico.