Ing. Oskar Stössel

Genre and portrait painter and etcher. b 1879 in Neunkirchen (Lower Austria), died 1964 in Vienna.

Student of C. Damianos and Fr. Kalmorgen. Taught etching by Leo Diet and Ferdinand Schmutzer.

Received the Staatspreis (State Prize) in 1909 at the annual exhibition in Graz, and in 1910 at the annual exhibition the Silver Medal of the City of Graz. Became a member of the Vereins Bildender Künstler Steiermarks (Association of Syrian Visual Artists) in 1912. 1919 Member of the Vienna Künstlerhaus

Oskar Stössel was already a civil engineer when he began his education at the State Art School in Graz, which he continued at the Vienna Academy under Ferdinand Schmutzer. In the inter-war period, he was well known for his portrayals of famous people of arts and sciences, nobles and wealthy, to whom he had gained access through his brother, the actor, Ludwig Stössel. His color etchings of Graz and Styria received international respect, including exhibits in London. While he favored a realistic style for his graphics and commissioned work, in the 1920s he also painted a series of landscapes in an expressively reduced style.

He became a member of B'nai Brith in Vienna, December 4, 1928. According to his B'nai Brith membership record, in 1936, Ing. Oskar Stössel, "akademischer Maler" lived at Waaggasse 17, Wien 4.

He arrived in New York aboard the vessel Manhattan, 3 March 1939, and filed a Declaration of Intention in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 19 July 1939.

After the "Anschluss" in 1938, he emigrated from Vienna to the USA and was responsible for visual arts in the cultural department of the Austrian exile organization "Austrian Action - Free Austrian Movement". He also made a name for himself in the USA with portraits, including that of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. After the war, he remained in the US, but returned to Austria in the 1950s.

In 1959, his work was honored in New York in a special exhibition.

In 1962, Eleanor Roosevelt died and left $10,000 to her physician, Dr. A. David Gurewitsch. She also left an etching of her husband by Oskar Stössel.