Gerda Margaretha Jenssen

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Gerda Margaretha Jenssen (born March 24, 1904 in Moscow , † after 1952 in Hechendorf am Pilsensee , Upper Bavaria, also Tulja Jenssen or Tulja Kaiser ) was a German photo model and painter.

Life

The wealthy parents fled the Russian Revolution. At the age of 17, the daughter came to Berlin via Switzerland, Holland, Sweden and France . a. Florence Henri from New York, Maria Magdalena Christiansen, called Magdila from Flensburg and Margarete Schall from Gelsenkirchen, who attended the private painting school of Johann Walter-Kurau . She herself attended Emil Rudolf Weiß's classes at the Berlin School of Applied Arts . Since then she has called herself Tulja or Thuly.

On May 28, 1924, she married the architect Heinrich Alfred Kaiser in Potsdam and lived in the Stadtheide estate on Zeppelinstrasse , which he built and is now a listed building . In the "golden 20s", in which Berlin experienced a new bloom in art, culture and entertainment, Kaiser was a well-known dancer and teacher of the Argentine tango. In 1926 he danced in Berlin with Josephine Baker . The marriage of Tulja and Heinrich Kaiser was divorced in January 1930 because, according to the court ruling, Kaiser went to "cafes, dance floors and bars" and "had relationships with another lady."

While Kaiser had turned successfully to painting for a long time and was enjoying success as a portraitist for high society, Tulja went to Paris, where she renewed her friendship with Florence Henri and Magdila Christiansen, who was in a relationship with the Jewish sculptor Joseph Hebroni . After visiting the Bauhaus in Dessau in Paris, Florence Henri established herself as an avant-garde artist with a photo studio. Tulja Kaiser and Margarete Schall were among their most popular models around 1930, the portrait photos were published in the magazine “Das Lichtbild 1929/1930” and the English magazine “Studio”: “Portrait Composition (Tulia Kaiser)”. In the exhibition in the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume 2015 in Paris , several photos of Florence Henri with Tulja were on view. An exhibition agreed at the time at the well-known dealer of avant-garde art Alfred Flechtheim became obsolete when he emigrated to London in 1934.

Heinrich Kaiser and his brothers joined the resistance around Carl Goerdeler and the men of July 20, 1944 . His brother Hermann was executed in Plötzensee, Heinrich died in 1946 as a result of his imprisonment. Tulja, who had again taken on her maiden name Jenssen, entered into a partnership with Thea Frenssen , a multiple German figure skating champion , during the war and the German occupation of Paris in Oberammergau . Thea Frenssen was a relative of the folk writer Gustav Frenssen . In 1943 the two friends visited Gustav Frenssen in Barlt / Dithmarschen where he lived. Tulja Jenssen represented her anti-fascist stance towards Frenssen, who then referred to her as a demagogue and expelled her from the house, but Frenssen's wife Anna kept in contact with both women. A contemporary witness describes Tulja Jensen as elegant and reserved, with an extremely distinctive and beautiful face. She also reports that in the neighboring house of Frenssen, the pastorate, "Moucky" Christiansen, a sister of Magdila, was housed as a bombed out from Berlin. Towards the end of the war, Madgila Christiansen hid her Jewish husband, the sculptor Joseph Hebroni, here. After the war, the entire circle of friends returned to Paris, Tulja Jenssen began, like Margarete Schall before , to paint again under the influence of Raoul Dufy . Since 1952 she lived in Hechendorf a. Pilsensee in Upper Bavaria. It is not known when she died.

Tulja Jenssen, Jardin du Luxembourg, around 1948

Exhibitions

1959: Stockholm 1963: Tulja Jenssen, oil paintings. Watercolors, Gurlitt Gallery, Hofgartenarkaden, Munich

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kunstverein Flensburg (ed.), Two Flensburg women in Paris Magdila Hebroni M. Christiansen on this: Joseph Hebroni, Flensburg 1964
  2. ↑ Peter M. Kaiser (ed.), Courage to Confess. The secret diaries of Captain Hermann Kaiser 1941/1943, Berlin 2010, p. 608.
  3. ^ Divorce decree of January 6, 1930, private archive of Dr PM Kaiser.
  4. ↑ Florence Henri. Miroir des Avant-Gardes (1927–1940), Editions Photosynthesis & Jeu des Paume, Paris 2015.
personal data
SURNAME Jenssen, Gerda Margaretha
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jenssen, Tulja (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German photo model and painter
DATE OF BIRTH March 24, 1904
PLACE OF BIRTH Moscow
DATE OF DEATH after 1952
Place of death Hechendorf am Pilsensee , Upper Bavaria