Walter Gotschke – I draw cars. This was Walter Gotschke, who had been pitched into this locality by the turmoil of the war . . . a few days later, met again in Gotschke's tiny studio . . . And Walter Gotschke began to tell :. . . And it was here, where Walter Gotschke was in his element . . . In 1941 Walter Gotschke was drafted into Military Service. . . . Gotschke became, for a short time, an American prisoner of war . . . the visitor from Bregenz left Gotschke's tiny studio . . . In 1949 Walter Gotschke returned to Stuttgart . . . Walter Gotschke, this artistic genius of international renown . . .

 In Memoriam

It was the year 1947.
The place was Bregenz, a small Austrian city on Lake Constance, where it's »Festival Week« was being held for the second time.Here, at the western tip of Austria, the prosperity of neutral Switzerland came into contact with the devalued standard of life of a country scarred by the aftermath of the Second World War. And some of the visitors to the Festival were given sight of a man, aged about 35 years, who seemed to be behaving in a curious way.
Crouching down, he kept circling round parked automobiles, all of which carried the emblem CH, the national Swiss identity mark; and inspecting them from the strangest angles. All these vehicles had one thing in common. They were exclusively American automobiles.
Passers-by looked on in amusement. And, when he crouched downyet again, scrutinizing through screwed-up eyes the chromed outlines of a Cadillac, one of the onlookers could not restrain himself and enquired »Excuse me – but what are you really doing here?« The man stood up, shook the dust from his trench coat and replied
This was Walter Gotschke, who had been pitched into this locality by the turmoil of the war, so recently ended.
He quickly retrieved his briefcase and gloves which he had thrown down on the tarmac, fascinated by the Cadillac. The two men exchanged some words, including their addresses; and, a few days later, met again in Gotschke's tiny studio in the Stubai Valley.
There, amidst a mass of papers, the visitor saw a welter of dynamic sketches – cars drawn from every angle, and scenes of people in which a car was always a leading feature.
And Walter Gotschke began to tell his story: – Ever since he could recall, he had always drawn as if possessed. His entire childhood had been filled by drawing. Wherever he went or happened to be, he would draw. At first it was animals . . . standing, sitting, jumping . . . horses, sheep, goats, dogs . . .
In his blacksmith father's smithy every piece of farm equipment there displayed for sale was sketched over with chalk, because Gotschke had no pencil or paper. In kindergarten, then at school, all his papers and exercise books were crammed with scribbles, down to the last little corner.Even garden fences and electric-lighting pylons revealed the route followed to school by little Gotschke. They were decorated with a chalked animal.
»Later, when I was about ten years old, I saw, for the very first time,
a car, parking in the small Silesian village (part of the former Austrian Monarchy) where I lived. Completely stunned, I stared at this old-fashioned vehicle as if in trance. I sharpened my pencil and from then on all my exercise books were filled with automobile doodles. It was »autosuggestion« in the best sense of the word.« His initial dalliance became a hobby and then, with the passing time, an unrestrained passion.
From far away – the famous Juneks from Prague with their Bugatti victories were the sensation of the time – exotic names found their way into Walter's isolated village: Targa Florio – Alfa Romeo – Maserati – Minoia – Brilli Peri – Monthlery – Delage – Divo – etc . . .
In time, Walter felt drawn to the city, to Brno, to study architecture; but, to tell the truth, to be near the automobile. He could not have imagined that before long, one of the most spectacular of automobile races would take place on the outskirts of this city, over country roads and through villages, like a mini Targa Florio or Mille Miglia: »the Masaryk Grand Prix«.
Here in Brno, as an architectural student, Walter experienced his first local motor races, and he was barely seventeen when in 1929 the daily press printed his race sketches of the »Ecce-Homo Hill Climb« – the first published work of his life. Two years later, his street poster announced the Grand Prix of Czechoslovakia. By now, at nineteen, he was allowed entry everywhere at all events; could study all the notables of racing at close quarters; and capture the competing cars from every angle.
The Masaryk Grand Prix of Czechoslovakia rounded off the season and all of the world's elite racing drivers came to the »last battle«. It was here that the young Rosemeyer won his first Grand Prix in 1935; where he first met the pioneer aviation Elly Beinhorn, later his wife, and where Alfa Romeo driver Nuvolari as a guest first sat in an Auto Union for a few test laps.
And it was here that Walter Gotschke, having just finished his studies and a complete unknown, was in his element. By 1938, when he left his home country to work in Germany, all the changes in the race cars of two generations were etched in his memory. And he knew exactly the posture and driving style of all the racing drivers.
Gotschke continued  »Before the war, I was fortunate to work for Daimler-Benz in Stuttgart as an advertising artist. It was an interesting task to present to the public, from the blueprints of the engineers in the most appealing and technical accurate way, the new car models; before they had even been put on the market for sale.
It was also one of my tasks to create the promotional posters of the great international races. These posters were printed in advance long before the first engine was heard at the circuit. Just after the race when the victor became known, by a clever printing process the text giving details of his victory was added together with the starting number of the winning car. In this way it was possible, the very next morning, for the Mercedes-Benz victory posters with the authentic starting number of the actual winner to shine from the walls of every European Capital.«
The good fortune of working for Daimler-Benz lasted only three years. In 1941 Walter Gotschke was drafted into Military Service.He was assigned to an armoured regiment on the Eastern front as a press illustrator, and was received by General Guderian, who immediately retained him for a fresh set of duties within the new training schools of the armoured corps near Berlin. Then, due to the transfer of this corps just before the end of hostilities, Gotschke found himself in the Austrian Tyrol, then a part of the German Reich for some years.
In 1945, after the war had ended, Gotschke became, for a short time,
an American prisoner of war – »You could not even hide between two rocks. They found you anywhere« – and thereafter he made a living
as a cowherd for Austrian farmers.
But it was not long before his sketches of cows and mountains were seen in the »Tiroler Tageszeitung«. And already Daimler-Benz had put out feelers to him, and commissioned the first of the advertising works that were to follow.
Impressed by all he had heard and seen, the visitor from Bregenz left Gotschke's tiny studio – and straightaway, over the next weekend, buyers of the »Wochenpost« could read his aticle about this extraordinary and fascinating encounter in the Stubai Valley.
In 1949 Walter Gotschke returned to Stuttgart where he became feverishly active. Although associated with various car manufacturers – first Mercedes in Stuttgart, followed by Ford in Cologne – he nevertheless retained the freedom to accept commissions from other firms, or other individual special projects. This gave him connections
in Turin, Detroit, London and Tokyo.
Whenever his deadlines permitted he went to motor racing events,
on which he reported by brush for car magazines. This hobby developed into his chosen »profession« where motor sport of the past and present came to life under his hand, appearing in Motor Revue,
in Quattroroute, Sports Illustrated, Road & Track, in Auto, Motor und Sport and elsewhere. And, until his final day, he was retained as
a member of the permanent artist's panel of the luxury Automobile Quarterly Magazine, where, by his article »Is your Car an Egg or a Potato?«, his fascination with American automotive design reached its climax.
Then, in 1984, just returned from the Dallas Grand Prix and whilst he was completing the Automobile Quarterly centennial story »100 Years of Mercedes-Benz«  the sight in his right eye began to trouble him. He had already been blind in his left eye for some years, due to a minor stroke. The following year he spent most of his time in hospitals, but it proved impossible to save what sight remained. The last fifteen years of his life were spent by him in complete blindness, in the countryside of southern Germany.
Walter Gotschke, this artistic genius of international renown, who had enjoyed neither teacher nor mentor and had taught himself to draw and paint – coming from the quiet of the countryside where a car was seldom seen –, had created his own life long romance with the automobile. And back in the quiet of the countryside he closed his eyes forever in the autumn of 2000.
His oeuvre is administrated by his second wife, Gerhild Drücker-Gotschke. Enjoy looking into www.gotschke-art.com