My Art - Oil Painting, Watercolor, Music & Digital Art
Herbert Lippert - Universalartist, an impressive word
Opera and visual arts - opera singer and painter.
Does the combination of the two arts, the performing and the visual arts, justify the name Universalartist?
Already as a soprano soloist with the Wiener Sängerknaben I began to submit with joy to the passion "music", in the brilliant continuation as a tenor at the Vienna State Opera, optimized by the indispensable desire to be active as a visual artist.
The longing for the fascination of painting in its variety of possibilities from oil painting to watercolor.
To live and combine both art genres intensively was and is reason enough for the apt term "universal artist". An opera singer is also an actor, a painter is also a visionary.
The versatility of art as a liberating element gives the word "universal" a deeper meaning that applies not only to me, but in the broadest sense to all artists.
Ölmalerei
Seit meiner Jugend bin ich von der Ölmalerei fasziniert. Die Vorstellung, Farben aus der Tube auf die Leinwand zu bringen, löst große Vorfreude aus. Schon dabei beginnen in meiner Phantasie die ersten Bilder des Gemäldes zu entstehen. Ich überlege die Farbgebung, die Form, die Leinwandgröße, die Technik und das damit verbundene Risiko: Starte ich mit dem Hintergrund oder dem Kern des Bildes, oder entscheide ich spontan vor der Leinwand?
Seit meiner Jugend bin ich von der Ölmalerei fasziniert. Die Vorstellung, Farben aus der Tube auf die Leinwand zu bringen, löst große Vorfreude aus. Schon dabei beginnen in meiner Phantasie die ersten Bilder des Gemäldes zu entstehen. Ich überlege die Farbgebung, die Form, die Leinwandgröße, die Technik und das damit verbundene Risiko: Starte ich mit dem Hintergrund oder dem Kern des Bildes, oder entscheide ich spontan vor der Leinwand?
As always, music serves as a template - a song by Franz Schubert that has just been sung, an aria from an esteemed opera, or a contemporary composition. Modern music also opens up new artistic aspects and paths.
Which role am I currently singing at the Vienna State Opera? Which cycle am I currently working on, which role fits my artistic ideas?
Or vice versa: Is the opera by Richard Wagner, which I have just sung, adequate at this moment to be realized pictorially? The constant attempt to harmoniously combine both art genres is a wonderful task.
After all, the finished painting is created days before the real implementation of the work in the
individual, artistic - virtual space. So the real challenge begins with the first brushstroke.
Watercolor
A watercolor is a simple thing! I often hear that. A little water, a little color and a beautiful watercolor painting is created. The moment the paint and water combine with the watercolor paper, gullibility is over. Help! What is the paint doing? What path does it take on the paper?
​
Watercolor painting naturally encourages a certain spontaneity and creativity, and it's certainly nice to be passionate about it in the beginning, but that alone is not enough.
Brush, paint and water - this trio holds some secrets. Among other things, the knowledge of the most diverse techniques and their application, as well as a certain feeling for colors and their effect. Momentum and agility paired with the most important basic knowledge open up the world of watercolor painting to every beginner. Practice and perseverance then make the great artist!
There is nothing more beautiful and spectacular than to dive into nature with watercolor block, paints and brushes and paint the most beautiful moments. All impressions can be implemented immediately. Uniqueness and uniqueness are the components of watercolor painting and therefore extremely attractive.
There is no opera house and its surroundings that I have not yet painted. I have already immortalized many idyllic squares and alleys around the great concert halls, documented rehearsals and costumes pictorially, the multicultural cities of the world, from London to New York, from Salzburg to Florence and from Steinbach am Attersee to Grinzing - painted and framed. Experienced and observed from the moment - wonderful!
Digital Art
Digital art is a challenge for an established painter and artist. Digital art as such - if I may say so - initially overtook and overwhelmed me when it arrived as if in one fell swoop and in an instant.
​
Well, years ago I admired and also smiled a bit at a painter friend of mine from the venerable circles of the Augustinian canons, when he - one of the first - "painted" crazy dots and strokes on colored backgrounds with the computer and his mouse.
These "works of art" were later used very successfully as CD covers and admired by many as innovative and modern. I myself was a bit speechless at first, although I quite liked it.
What? Digital art! Not with me!
What do I do with it, how do I deal with this art form, what do I get out of it, why do I do it? - and much more! These were more my thoughts and flashes of inspiration.
Digital art has taken a quantum leap recently. Just think of the NFT hype, the countless online platforms for selling digital art, the many speculators and artists, all in one pot, all impulsive and full of hope for the quick buck, the filthy lucre - and all a little clueless. The crash was mostly pre-programmed and came quickly.
​
Just think of the many miserably failed attempts by thriving museums to sell paintings by Klimt and Picasso as NFTs around the world. Just think of the many artists who docked on numerous platforms to sell their digital art and ultimately sank into digital nirvana like the ship of the Flying Dutchman.
​
Digital art will recover, reinvent and quickly position itself in the form of an innovative new development and - I want and will be a part of it!
Music - singing and tenor
Music relaxes me the second I hear it. It makes me free and calm. You could also say: music takes us to higher spheres, abruptly puts us in a different mood and frees our thoughts. Ultimately, this is also the case, at least it depends on what kind of music you listen to. Is it a ripple that distracts us, or a harmonic overture that then really relaxes and calms us, or an aggressive rock that gets us going, or even a polka that we jump up and dance to at the same moment!
What a power of music!
A waltz by Johann Strauss in the interpretation of Nikolaus Harnoncourt with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra is a liberation for me. All unpleasant and exhausting thoughts are blown away. There remains only joy, light and leisure. You should always listen to waltzes when you go shopping - at the expense of your wallet.
Especially with me!
As a performing musician and tenor, one naturally has a significant advantage over the "music consumer" who is primarily dependent on the music being performed. As a singer and tenor, I am able to heal and treat myself through my singing, my voice and the resulting interpreted music. I am literally my own psychotherapist.
Many people ask me how I bear or endure these demands on stage, the exhausting learning phases, the endless rehearsals and the hectic preparations for what I hope will be a successful musical evening - be it a concert or an opera performance.
​
My answer is, as always: It's the music! To sing yourself, to experience music yourself, to interpret it yourself and to be responsible for the success - that makes you happy and satisfied. Thanks to the music!