By Sast Report Correspondants   In an italian village a saying goes: 'An old Fox once saw a big black Raven fly off with a piece of yellow cheese in its beak and settle on a branch of a tree. "That's for me, as I am a Fox," he cried. "How well you are looking today, how glossy your feathers, how bright your eye," he said to the Raven, "I feel sure your voice must surpass that of other birds, just as your figure does, let me hear but one song from you." The Raven lifted up her head, but she did not open her mouth, and the piece of cheese did not fall to the ground. So the Fox tried something else: "Where do you come from, where do you live, where have you been so long?" The Raven again lifted up her head, without opening her mouth and pressing her teeth together, muttered something almost unintelligible: "Son zenesen, ris, res, stringo i denti e parlo sei," and again the piece of cheese did not fall to the ground.' A woman from Genoa said when she met Paul Flora, she told him this story which every Genoese knows.     Prof. Paul Flora posing for a photograph in front of one of his drawings. Photo SAST REPORT     Paul Flora, born 1922 in Glurns, South Tyrol, living in Innsbruck since 1928, is well known for his black ink line drawings in the German and Austrian art scene. The then young artist spent his formative years in Bavaria. From 1942-1944 Flora studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich under the Norwegian draftsman and painter Olaf Gulbransson, who worked for the political magazine Simplicissimus. After World War II he occupied a house in the exclusive residential area Saggen in Innsbruck together with the artists Gerhild Diesner, Bodo Kampmann, and the architect Jörg Sackenheim. Paul Flora's early works are influenced by Alfred Kubin with whom a friendship developed. At that time he frequently visited the Art Club Vienna, founded 1947 by Gustav Karl Beck, Albert Paris Gütersloh, Maria Bilger, Susanne Wenger and Fritz Wotruba. For a few years the Art Club was situated in the basement of the Loos Bar. The "Strohkoffer", as the jazz club in the basement was named, was considered the nightly meeting place for artists, for example Arnulf Rainer, Friedensreich Hundertwasser, and writers, like the young H. C. Artmann, in the post-war Vienna. Arnulf Rainer told SAST REPORT that he was not accepted as member of the Art Club: "In den Strohkoffer bin i reinkommen, in den Art Club nicht." The reason: "Unseriöse Kunst."     Stilleben mit einem Raben, Paul Flora 2003, drawing with ink pen, color pencil. Photo SAST REPORT An annual ritual in the alpine town Innsbruck: Paul Flora signing a copy of his latest art calendar at the Galerie Thomas Flora on the 3rd floor of a historic Herzog Friedrich Street building in the old town where the famed artist usually celebrates his solo exhibition - vivid, darkly foreboding, partly mythical. "Flora is no stranger to this sort of staging. In fact, he every year in July turns scenes like this into art. His own wild, cynical, dark humored invention. Dark and dismal as of the rivers Acheron and Styx in Hades. "And he finds a ready and receptive audience. "We high-tailed it into the small, decrepit elevator, dragging a native of Innsbruck along with us. When the elevator door finally closed, she let out a nervous sigh. Suddenly she said: 'Ihr stinkt's, ihr stinkt's nach Parfum! ... and then the 'Älplerin' exclaimed in disgust: 'Scheiss Chanel! ... 'Die Finger sind a no' ang'strichen!' ... 'Korrespondenten seit's ... Sandler!' ... Howling like a wounded chamois buck: 'Deutsche Journalisten sind wenigstens Terrorischten' ... and was quiet again. "A small room, snow white walls, new ink drawings black framed, light brown wooden ceiling with severe lines, everything in order, neat desks, neat personnel. In this clean, black and white setting, Flora, cultivated, charming, somewhere in his early eighties, struck a refreshingly discordant note - with his untamed mane brushing his forehead, in his blue short-sleeved shirt, gray pants and well worn shoes. "Flora's eyes, steely, flashing brilliantly and his deep resonant voice commands attention. He looked good - reassuringly good. "Flora is not alone. Standing nearby is a middle aged woman wearing dark sunglasses and dressed in black for the part who we identified as a member of the family. "It is warm, he has one of the windows wide open and a white plastic fan running at max speed and he is bent over a white writing table. Flora is mumbling 'Der Vorname ist genug', and he is not kidding. She again gives her best smile and watching him curiously supplies the information he doesn't want to hear: Surname, forename, date of birth, place of birth. It is clearly out of her hands. Between interruptions from his two female assistants busy screening the constant flow of exhibition visitors, he mumbles again 'Der Vorname ist genug', signs the calendar and briskly hands it to her. "She smiles at him, so smartly, so confidingly and a few minutes ago she whispered, 'maestro, maestro ...', then swiftly leaves the room with the newly acquired art calendar under her arm, but without even saying 'au revoir'. "We're well into the second hour now and there won't be many more this year, no matter what. He only signs his works once a year, which means he is finished soon. He is signing his last calendar and working over the drawing he sometimes adds, smiling only rarely and fleetingly, and I think I just heard him say, 'Enough is enough,' which may mean that the exhibition visitors will have to leave. "It is almost seven p.m. Suddenly a voice is screaming: "O shit, what are these goddam animals" Then it is quiet again. Everyone stares at the door of the elevator. Someone sent the plumbers' unit. 'Älpler', come on the scene -- tense for the action, nervous, hungry as hunters. Two men. Nicknamed the "Pathologist" and the "Jellyfish". A guest broke out laughing: "As long as they don't touch me, it's OK." "The older one, a former nightclub owner, usually talkative, corpulent and rugged, wearing an undersized shirt and red basketball shoes finally stands stockstill in front of a new ink drawing and clenched his right fist. "The small and unusually fat one with thick, smudged glasses, looking like a ragged version of bibendum, the Michelin man gorges himself on a huge, dripping mound of salmon baps, says something in his high wild voice and finally burps twice. "Mayonnaise drips to the floor. "Paul Flora quickly looks upward, points with his pen hand at Jellyfish and chuckles. "It was obvious to one and all that Paul Flora had won the day. "The first time I uncased the camera - a Rolleiflex - was in the late sixtees, after we met the unifying symbol of arab nationalism, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, for an exclusive, personal interview in an apartment of one of his nationalist supporters, near the central railway station. "It was warm, Lyndon B. Johnson, the former senator from Texas and Kennedy's vice president was president, the relations between Egypt and the United States had begun to slip into the period of Violence, the Governor of Tyrol Wallnöfer had troubles coming to terms with his past, and a young artist was bent over a writing table. He had one of the windows wide open and a white metal fan running at max speed as someone had just paid almost one dollar American for electricity. "At the same time, a young then unknown Cairo educated engineer, a dynamic man without a home or a country was watching the scene from a distance, being largely ignored by exhibition visitors. Only a few knew that this man was on space shot's to the chairman's job." Photo SAST REPORT   Since 1950 Paul Flora developed the dainty, thin and soft outline drawing, an unmistakable line technique, which he is easily identified with. Recurrent themes are cities lik Venice and Munich, the topics acrobats, military sceneries, beer drinkng contests, "Älpler", tyrolese peasants, autumn moods, Richard Wagner, Napoleon Bonaparte, Friedrich Nietzsche and Edgar Allen Poe. A frequent motive is the black raven, which has turned into his trademark. In 1985 he was awarded the "Grosses Bundesverdienstkreuz" by Dr. Richard von Weizsäcker. Flora's acquaintance with Marion Gräfin von Dönhoff made it possible that he worked as illustrator for the german weekly "Die Zeit" from 1957 to 1971, which is what made him well known. Most of the nearly 3000 drawings he published at that newspaper in Hamburg, he has burned in the garden of his house in Innsbruck. "I bin nach hinten in Garten gangen, hab an grossen Haufen g'macht und sie alle ang'schirrt," Paul Flora recently said in an interview with the viennese "Falter".