Josef Maria Auchentaller

Josef Maria Auchentaller (2 August 1865 – 31 December 1949) was an Austrian painter, draftsman, and printmaker associated with the Vienna Secession and the Art Nouveau style.

Josef Auchentaller attended the Technical College in Vienna from 1882–1886. He attended the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna starting in 1890, and there he excelled and won several awards.[1] In 1885, he fell in love with Emma Scheid, the daughter of a prosperous manufacturer of silverware and jewelry. The couple married in 1891 after her father was convinced of Auchentaller’s social and financial suitability. They had a daughter, Maria Josepha, and a son, Peter.[2]

Beginning in 1895, he contributed art nouveau designs for his father-in-law’s company, G.A. Scheid. From 1892–1896, the Auchentallers lived in Munich, where he studied under Paul Hoecker, a founder of the 1892 Munich Secession. Auchentaller contributed to Jugend, the German Secession review established in 1896.