Artist Info
Otto Rapp
Otto Rapp lived and was educated in Vienna, where later he worked as a clerk in the Transport and Insurance Business. After completing service in the Austrian Air Force, he traveled throughout Europe, eventually settling in Stockholm, Sweden. As a Painter he was initially self taught, studying in the various Galleries and Museums. In Vienna, Otto was often ‘hanging out’ at the Akademie der Bildenden Kuenste, where he admired the work of the Wiener Schule des Phantastischen Realismus represented there by the Professors Ernst Fuchs, Rudolf Hausner and Arik Brauer. In Stockholm, Otto found out that he was washing dishes in the very same Restaurant where years earlier another Viennese Artist, Fritz Hundertwasser , the ‘Austrian Gaudi’ as he was later known as, had worked the same job. Encouraged by an art dealer in Gamla Stan, Otto began to paint more seriously. Busking on the streets of Gamla Stan with a Dutch artist, his very first painting was sold to a passer-by by his artist friend while Otto stood in the employment office line - this paid for a lavish meal for both of them that day.
Traveling around in 1968, Otto wound up in Western Canada where he eventually settled in Lethbridge, Alberta, the place Otto still calls home today. It was in Canada where the majority of Otto's mature work was produced (under the sponsorship of a small Lethbridge Gallery). Working for the Canadian Pacific Railway, he quit in 1977 to attend the Bachelor of Fine Arts Program at the University of Lethbridge, graduating (with great distinction) in 1982. In Canada, Otto participated in many exhibitions, and held several Solo Shows, culminating in the pivotal 1994 showing at The Prairie Art Gallery in Grande Prairie, Alberta, which earned him the moniker "The Mystic." Throughout his years in Canada, Otto had been the subject of many reviews and newspaper articles as well as local television shows in Calgary and Lethbridge while being active as an Artist, Art Instructor, Curator, Studio Technician, Art Critic and Juror. Otto is currently residing in Vienna, Austria, working in his studio at the Palais Palffy, which also houses the Phantasten Museum Wien.
