Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]
German Postwar Modern
1.5M ratings
277k ratings

See, that’s what the app is perfect for.

Sounds perfect Wahhhh, I don’t wanna
image
image

In recent years several publications have finally shed light on the pioneering contribution of women to the discipline art history: e.g. Rosa Schapire and Lu Märten have received their due appreciation and their work has been acknowledged as equal to their male colleagues’. Another long forgotten female art historian is Grete Ring (1887-1952), Berlin-born and the offspring of a widespread Jewish family that, among others, included painter Max Liebermann. Thanks to her liberal bourgeois background Ring was able to attend private institutions that prepared her for the „Abitur“ certificate which allowed her to study at university. But since women weren’t allowed to study in Prussia, Ring took up her art history studies in Berlin as guest student in 1906, a situation that only changed in 1908. During this time Heinrich Wölfflin is her primary professor who teaches his students art history as a combination of perceptive psychology and systematic formal analyses. In 1912 Ring earned her doctorate with a thesis on 15th and 16th century Dutch painting.

With the degree in her pocket Ring embarked on an impressive career in the art world that is vividly portrayed in the first ever biography of Grete Ring written by Sonja Hilzinger and recently published by Reimer: based on extensive research in often piecemeal archives Hilzinger traces Ring’s life and career and portrays a woman that was as exceptionally witty, headstrong and independent. After earning her doctorate she worked at Munich’s Alte Pinakothek, Berlin museums and as freelance art journalist. But after WWI her economic situation required a better-paid job that she found at Paul Cassirer’s gallery where she, among other things, gained attention for identifying forged Van Gogh paintings delivered to the gallery for an exhibition. In parallel Ring continued to write and do research about art, even during her forced exile in London: in 1949 she published „A Century of French Painting 1400–1500“, her well-received magnum opus.

Sonja Hilzinger’s biography provides a meritorious, well-documented and highly readable account of an outstanding art historian’s life and work that so deserved to be uncovered. Chapeau!

grete ring art historian art history art book biography modern art reimer verlag book
image
image

Johannes Niemeyer (1890-1980) was one of the most versatile artists and architects of the 20th century in German yet still little known: as painter, sculptor and architect he left an extensive oeuvre that is characterized by an overarching quality, irrespective of the medium. Niemeyer was born in Halle/Saale, completed a carpentry apprenticeship at the Deutsche Werkstätten Hellerau and later studied architecture in Munich under Theodor Fischer, an impressive education that clearly mirrors his talents. Between 1921 and 1924 he taught as professor at the Kunstgewerbeschule Burg Giebichenstein and subsequently worked as independent architect in Halle and Berlin. His major architectural projects date back to this period and include a number of remarkable and elegant villas and houses as well as the Schule der Arbeit in Leipzig, a building that was usurped by the N*zis shortly after they seized power in 1933.

In line with Niemeyer’s obscurity there is very little literature on his life and work with the exception of the present catalogue: it was published in 1990 by Berlinische Galerie and represents the only comprehensive publication on his multifaceted work as it covers his paintings, drawings and architecture. The catalogue follows Niemeyer’s life up until his late years in the GDR and gathers plenty of his paintings, student works, architectural projects as well as the enchanted garden surrounding his Berlin home. In view of the fact that the book is already 35 years old a new and all-encompassing publication on Johannes Niemeyer’s would be desirable. But since a recently published volume attends to the Schule der Arbeit in Leipzig there’s a glimpse of hope!

johannes niemeyer architecture book modernism modernist architecture germany book vintage book