Alfred Roller was an Austrian painter, graphic designer, and set designer. He was born on October 2,1864, in Brno, Czechia. His university education began in 1883 at the University of Vienna where he studied law but his interest in art led him to attend lectures at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. By 1884, he was able to change the trajectory of his education and enrolled at the Vienna Academy where he studied with Eduard Peithner von Lichtenfels and Christain Griepenkerl.

In 1900, Roller headed the Department of Figurative Drawing at the Imperial-Royal School of Applied Arts of the Austrian Museum of Art and Industry in Vienna. The following year he was elevated to a full professor.

Roller was a founding member of the Vienna Secession and designed numerous exhibition posters. Roller became president of the movement in 1902 and editor-in-chief of the Secession’s magazine, Ver Sacrum. He also served as the director of the Kunstgewereschule in Vienna. When the Secession movement dissolved in 1905, Roller turned his talents to theatre set design, especially for the Vienna Court Opera. He worked closely with Gustav Mahler, Max Reinhart, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and Johann Strauss.

In the 1960s, Roller’s stylized graphic designs highly influenced the poster art of psychedelic age.

Alfred Roller died on June 21, 1935 in Vienna, Austria.