Alfred Spitzer studied law at the University of Vienna from 1879, graduating in 1889. Spitzer had previously completed his military service as a one-year volunteer in the Imperial and Royal Army in 1884 and was transferred to the reserves in September 1885. In the same year, he joined the law firm of Friedrich Schönhof, and later the Hof- und Gerichts-Advokat (Royal Court and Judicial Court Advocate), whose entry in the list of advocates was made in 1894, finally settled as a defense lawyer in criminal matters at Hohenstaufengasse 17 in Vienna’s 1st district. It was probably around this time that Spitzer began collecting art, initially etchings and old engravings. His marriage to Hermine, née Spitzer, in 1896 resulted in daughters Hanna and Edith(a), who later married the theologian Friedrich Neumann. As a lawyer, he occasionally represented artists such as Egon Schiele, who paid him with their works of art, among other things. This seems to have had a lasting influence on the focus of his collection, which increasingly shifted towards contemporary art. His collection included works by Jehudo Epstein, Alois Beran, Tina Blau, Carl Fehringer, Rudolf Ribarz, Anton Faistauer, Walter Hampel, Max Slevogt, Alfred Kubin, Gustav Klimt, Robin Christian Andersen and Egon Schiele, and – according to his daughters – is said to have comprised around 800 works of art, which he kept in his law firm and the family home. Spitzer made public appearances as a lender, for example at exhibitions at the Künstlerhaus. Spitzer was accepted as an associate member in 1920, and in the following years he held the office of auditor and liaison officer for cash accounting. Alfred Spitzer died on 26 April 1923 at the age of 62 – the Internationale Sammler-Zeitung dedicated an extensive obituary to the “collector and art lover”. His collection passed to his wife and, after her death in 1930, to his two daughters Hanna and Edith. In 1935, parts of the collection – as well as the art collection of the dentist Heinrich Rieger – were presented or offered for sale in the fall exhibition of the Künstlerhaus. After the annexation of Austria to the German Reich in March 1938, the two sisters were able to move a large part of the collection abroad. In memory of their father, Hanna Spitzer bequeathed works from the extensive art collection of the lawyer Alfred Spitzer to the Belvedere, while Edith Neumann bequeathed works to the Albertina in 1981 and to Bard College New York in 2002.