Laufberger trained at both the
Academy of Fine Arts, Prague, and the
Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna. He initially painted
genre scenes of peasant and village life then, in 1855, on behalf of
Österreichischer Lloyd (a shipping company), travelled through the
Danube Vilayet to
Istanbul, creating a series of drawings that were made into popular
engravings. While in Istanbul, Laufberger made several connections with
Caucasus Germans that had settled in Istanbul, and the material he drew from them provided inspiration to his later work. A two-year travel grant from the Vienna Academy enabled him to visit several important art venues, beginning with Germany and Belgium. By 1862, he had visited London and Paris, then ended in Italy. In 1865, after returning to Vienna, he was entrusted with painting the curtain at the
Komische Oper. Three years later, he was appointed Professor of figure drawing at the new
University of Applied Arts. He created several small decorative works then, in 1877, he was engaged by the
Museum of Applied Arts to decorate their new building extension; creating a
frieze in
sgraffito and
frescoes on the stairwell, depicting
Venus, rising from the sea, surrounded by the arts. Two years later, he was commissioned to create decorations for the courtyard at the
Kunsthistorisches Museum (then under construction); hiring two assistants:
Ernst and
Gustav Klimt. He continued to paint genre scenes as well, and his later ones tended to be humorous in character. He also designed the
stained glass, created by , in the Industrial Hall at the
1873 Vienna World's Fair. In 1889, a street in
Leopoldstadt was renamed the "Laufbergergasse" in his honor. ==Sources==