On 28 June 2021 our board member, colleague and friend Emil Gruber passed away.
Most of you knew him: Emil was a great guy! During his prolific life, he generously spread joie de vivre around him. He collected stories and absurdities. He created and promoted artistic work and experiments with great passion.
We are sad that his departure was so early and arduous - but also very happy to have known him!
Emil is gone (obituary by Heidrun Primas)
It is not only with a heavy heart and full of sadness that we say goodbye to our former board member, fellow artist and friend, but above all with great gratitude for having been able to walk a little way with him, this joyful and wonderful person.
Most people have a smile on their lips when they talk about Emil, carry cheerful memories of him and like to share them. This was the case at our spontaneous gathering on the day of his death at the Forum Stadtpark, when I, as former president, delivered the sad news: He was supportively present at the right time, with his rich life experience, wise, prudent and reassuring manner and above all, irrepressible humour. This was also the case in 2020 when we successfully realised the charity auction - Pictures for Emil - at the Forum Stadtpark with the initiative of Günter Eisenhut. We didn't have to ask all the participating artists, reporting journalists and buyers who knew Emil for long; they were happy and proud to be able to contribute something for Emil.
What a beautiful legacy to leave a ray of light in other people's hearts, to conjure up a confident smile with a twinkling eye on their faces in memory.
Emil Gruber was a board member of Forum Stadtpark from 2017 to 2021. Only at the beginning of June did he hand over his office - admittedly in absentia - to his successors. He wanted to accompany the young people for another period, but unfortunately things turned out differently.
For many years before his Forum activity, Emil was already known as an active player in the Intro Graz section, the prenninger gesprächen, as an exhibition curator, journalist (with a focus on architecture, caricature and film), as a photographer with a focus on classic street photography and changes in urban life, and as a collector, archivist and preparer of materials on special topics in European cultural history of the 20th and 21st centuries, such as the development of political caricature, and much more.
His artistic work can be found in private and public collections.
Emil Gruber left us too early on 28.6.2021 after a long and serious illness shortly before his 62nd birthday.
He will be enormously missed as a provider of ideas, instigator and mediator in our art and cultural landscape, but above all as a colleague and friend. We will not forget him and often say: Emil would have told a story or a joke now and then we will smile....
All our sympathy and heartfelt thanks for the loving and devoted support goes to Gaby Jarosch, Emil's wife.
Farewell, Emil!
