George Kenner

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The painter George Kenner in Frith Hill tent camp, the camp for internees in the war in 1915.

George Kenner ; born Georg Kennerknecht (born November 1, 1888 in Schwabsoien , † July 10, 1971 in Cheltenham , Pennsylvania ) was a visual artist . During the First World War he painted 110 pictures and drawings while interned as a German civilian prisoner of war in Great Britain and on the Isle of Man .

Early life

Kenner attended an art school in Germany and emigrated to London in 1910, a few years before the First World War . There he worked as an advertising artist in the small advertising company Waddington & Kennerknecht, which he and an English partner founded. He attended evening classes at London's Lambeth Art School to learn airbrush techniques. After the start of the First World War, he was registered as an " alien enemy " on August 23, 1914 and then interned five days after the passenger ship RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine on May 7, 1915 . He received permission from the camp management to work artistically during his imprisonment. Numerous works were created that depict the living conditions of camp life.

Internment

Alexandra Sports Palace, London, Converted Into Winter Internment Camp 1915-16 Art.IWMART17072.jpg

Kenner was imprisoned in three camps. On May 12, 1915, he was first placed in a makeshift camp on Frith Hill, an area that is now part of the Pine Ridge Golf Center (near Frimley in Surrey ). The camp grew to 2,000 civilian prisoners, but since the tent camp was not winter-proof, it was closed and Kenner was moved to Alexandra Palace in North London on September 29, 1915 . 3,000 prisoners were held in three sections. In June 1916, Kenner was transferred to Knockaloe Internment Camp on the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea . 30,000 civil prisoners lived there until the end of the war and afterwards. Finally, four months after the armistice in March 1919, he was deported to Germany on a prisoner exchange.

Family and later life

On September 8, 1921, Kenner married the artist Margarete Bohne in Munich . Due to the poor supply situation after the First World War , two of their first three children died. In September 1927 the family emigrated to Cheltenham, Pennsylvania . There he managed to build a successful company by working from home as a freelance commercial artist. The family was naturalized as an American in 1934. In 1937 a fourth child, now Christa Kenner Bedford, was born. Kenner himself died of natural causes on July 10, 1971 at the age of 82.

His artistic work

Many of his drawings, the handwritten diary, drafts of business cards, receipts for payment of tuition fees at the Lambeth Art School, documents about his immigration as well as his registration as an " alien enemy " came to the Imperial War Museum in London in October 2005 .

Three other British museums acquired work done in their area during the war: the Surrey Heath Museum in Camberley , the Manx National Heritage Museum in Douglas , Isle of Man , and the Bruce Castle Museum in London.

Many of Kenner's paintings from the Frith Hill PoW camp period were published in Reflections - A Heatherside Miscellany by Nick McCormick in June 2006.

Several more of Kenner's paintings from the Alexandra Palace PoW period were published in the book Ally Pally Prison Camp by Maggie Butt, June 2011.

Web links

Commons : George Kenner  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
  • [1] George Kenner POW painting in Imperial War Museum, London, Photo Album
  • [2] George Kenner POW paintings in the Surrey Heath Museum, Camberley, Photo Album
  • [3] George Kenner POW paintings in Manx National Heritage Museum, Douglas, Isle of Man, Photo Album
  • [4] George Kenner POW painting in Bruce Castle Museum, London, Photo Album
  • [5] George Kenner's Hand-Written Interment Journal Photo Album
  • Kenner's work from the Imperial War Museum collection

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Through Art, German Expressed Experience Of Internment Camp . philly.com. Retrieved July 5, 2011.
  2. ↑ Veteran Artist Reemerges With Color . philly.com. Retrieved July 15, 2011.
  3. ↑ a b George Kenner Internment Journal . Retrieved April 19, 2014, George Kenner hand-written journal now at the Imperial War Museum, London.
  4. ^ A b c My Father - George Kenner - Memories by Christa Kenner Bedford . Retrieved March 26, 2014.
  5. ^ Reflections - A Heatherside Miscellany . McCormick, Nick.
  6. ^ Prison-camp life produces artwork of dichotomies . philly.com. Retrieved July 5, 2011.
  7. ↑ More albums added (May 20, '07) for George Kenner Art . Retrieved July 7, 2011.
  8. ^ Reflections - A Heatherside Miscellany . www.amazon.co.uk. Retrieved July 15, 2011.
  9. ↑ Ally Pally Prison Camp . www.overstepsbooks.com. Retrieved July 5, 2011.
personal data
SURNAME Connoisseur, George
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kennerknecht, Georg (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION visual artist
DATE OF BIRTH November 1, 1888
PLACE OF BIRTH Schwabsoien
DATE OF DEATH July 10, 1971
Place of death Cheltenham, Pennsylvania