My father, Ernst Eisenmayer, who has died aged 97, was a successful artist and sculptor who had many exhibitions in Britain, Austria, the Netherlands, the US, Japan and Italy.
He began showing his works in Britain in 1944, when he was featured in an exhibition of Austrian art in exile, and in 1946-1947 studied at the Camberwell School of Arts (now Camberwell College of Arts) in London, adding sculptures of wrought steel, bronze and stone to his painting.
He then worked for a small company in the capital designing and making jewellery, but as his art became increasingly respected, in 1962 he decided to become a full-time freelance artist. In 1969 he participated in a group exhibition of sculpture in New York and in 1970 contributed a large sculpture for the British pavilion at Expo ’70 in Japan.
Ernst was born in Vienna to poor Austro-Hungarian Jewish parents, Jakob Eisenmayer, an electrician, and his wife, Ester (nee Seidl). After secondary school he attended evening classes in painting and drawing, but with the German annexation of Austria in 1938 he tried to flee to France. Arrested at the border, he was sent to Dachau concentration camp north-west of Munich. Many of the drawings he made in the camp still exist.
His younger brother, Paul, had been able to get to Britain via Kindertransport, and Paul’s guardian there, Professor JL Brierley, managed to secure Ernst’s release from Dachau in April 1939 by promising to sponsor him in Britain. He was thus possibly one of the last prisoners to have been released from Dachau before the outbreak of the second world war.
After arriving in Britain Ernst was held in four different detention centres, where he made many drawings. His portrait of a violinist at Onchan camp on the Isle of Man was later issued as a stamp on the island. Acquiring British citizenship after the war, he worked temporarily as a toolmaker, painting in his free time under the guidance of the Austrian artist, poet and playwright Oskar Kokoschka, who became an important supporter of his career.
Eventually, in 1974, he left Britain for Italy, where he lived until 1988. After eight years in Amsterdam, in 1996 he finally returned to Austria, where he stayed at the Maimonides retirement home in Vienna until his death. In 2012 he received the Medal of Honour of the City of Vienna in recognition of his artistic work.
Ernst was married and divorced twice: first to Marcia Street and then to Lidy Bos. He is survived by two daughters, Julia and me, from his first marriage, a son, Thomas, from his second, two grandchildren, Alexander and Sarah, and a great-granddaughter, Rose. Another granddaughter, Timna, died last year.
