Otto Axer

Otto Axer was born in 1906 in Przemyśl, and died in 1983 in Warsaw. He was a Polish painter, teacher and set designer.

He spent his childhood in Lviv, his father ran a music school in that city. In 1924, he began studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow - he studied at the studios of Władysław Jarocki, Fryderyk Pautsch and Wojciech Weiss. After graduating in 1930, he went on a one-year scholarship to Paris. From 1932 he was a set designer for theaters in Warsaw, Łódź, Kraków and Lviv, he often collaborated with Leon Schiller. After the outbreak of World War II, he ended up in the Warsaw ghetto, from which he managed to escape. After the fall of the Warsaw Uprising, he was sent to the prisoner-of-war camp of Stalag XIa Altengrabow near Magdeburg. It was there until the end of the war in 1945.

After returning to Poland, he started working at the Polish Army Theater in Łódź, a few years later he moved to Warsaw and started working at the Polish Theater. In the years 1947-1952 he lectured at the State Higher School of Theater in Łódź, and from 1959 he created sets for Polish television.

In 1973, Otto Axer focused on painting and graphics. In 1979 he was honored with the title of Meritorious Member of the Association of Polish Stage Artists.