Gerhard Berger (artist)
Gerhard Berger (* 17th July 1933 in Solothurn ) is a German painter , graphic artist and emeritus professor and vice-rector of the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich .
Life
Born in Solothurn, Switzerland , the twelve-year-old Berger came with his parents in 1945 to Laiz in Hohenzollern , now a district of Sigmaringen , in Germany . His family was expelled from Switzerland in 1945: They had to pay the bitter price - Reich German families were generally suspected of collaborating with the Third Reich . This loss of his first home has shaped him. Inspired by his environment, Berger began to visualize it in his earliest childhood: However, his interest was not in drawing something as it shows itself, but in reproducing the motif in his own way. He also built his first piece of furniture when he was twelve. Originally, Berger's path into art should have started with studying at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart , but these required an apprenticeship as a carpenter. When only a coffin carpenter was available as an apprenticeship, Berger started a three-year apprenticeship as a typesetter in 1947 on the advice of his father . He came to advertising printing and thus to free design via the woodcut. From 1950 to 1953 he did a practical job, typography and applied graphics in Sigmaringen.
In 1953, at the age of 20, he began studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. Josef Henselmann , who also came from Laiz, was professor and president at the academy at the time. Henselmann succeeded in converting the free into the applied arts at the academy. He entrusted the student Berger with setting up the study workshop for typography and woodcut at the academy. Berger was later head of the study workshop at the same time as his studies. In return, Berger enjoyed the privilege of being able to move freely around the academy: he found the typography, which was strongly influenced by Bauhaus at the time , to be “too narrow” and the sculpting that was previously done by Hermann Hahn , a student of Adolf von Hildebrand , at the academy was taught to be "too conservative". With Anton Hiller as professor, Berger was able to evade reception . This also came from Hohenzollern, he grew up in Sigmaringendorf . Hiller, representative of free sculpture, like Robert Jacobsen , Hiller's successor and representative of modernism, had an influence on Berger's artistic work.
From 1964 to 1967 he was artistic director of the graphic studio SIP in Munich . From 1967 to 1975 he was a teacher for applied and experimental graphics and typography at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. During this time, artistic designs for the 1972 Summer Olympics were made . From 1975 until his retirement in 1999 he was professor, from 1971 to 1975 and 1997 to 1999 Vice Rector. At the same time, he always devoted himself to free artistic activity. Berger founded an artist community in Munich in which he worked with students as “ primus inter pares ”, so to speak, on an equal footing. He was the first teacher at the academy to give his students access to the new media and to that extent achieved something pioneering.
Since 1999, Berger has lived and worked as a freelance painter and graphic artist in Munich and Rohrbach .
Works
In a review in the Süddeutsche Zeitung that Uschi Anlauf wrote about Berger's works, mostly large-format paintings with a time spectrum ranging from his academic years to the present , “in each of his pictures, the almost infinite combinations of vision that fascinate Berger come to the Expression - whether he is experimenting with monochrome lines or with colors and surfaces ”. His painting is supplemented by graphic and typographic works as well as works of applied art, which have formed a second focus in his professional career.
In 2010 Berger dealt retrospectively with his artistic work in the course of the exhibition "GERHARD BERGER Painting and Graphics 1960 - 2010" in the Kreisgalerie Schloss Meßkirch , which shows 50 works from 50 years of creativity . His works, which are often trilogies , are shaped in color, form and content by an ancient, Christian symbolism. For him, the Trinity stands for three forces: the Father as the “keeper”, the Son as the “above” and the spirit as the “spiritually comprehensive”. His works are a mixture of free and technically applied activity. A correspondence or a juxtaposition with a lack of dialogue can arise between painting and drawing. The color is created by the environment and has undergone a development in each of his works. This can also be seen in the fact that Berger does not become artistically active from an actionism and creates art that is current on the day, but rather compresses a phenomenon into a sum of a whole.
Berger's approach is to put thinking ahead of the creation of the image. This leads to a sketch, which in turn experiences choloration and is then concretized. This can lead to changes in form, but also in content. Loosely based on John Cody, Berger draws the comparison that it is not the superficiality but the content of a work that is decisive. The formal language is derived from a pictorial interior.
Continuity shaped, but also briefly, for example, through phases of Cubism , Pop Art (Optical Verfremdung, 1968 to 1973), Industrial (Applied Graphics 1958 to 1965; “Robot One”, acrylic on canvas 2009) or the African formal language interrupted. This also explains advertising prints for Liebherr , Schwenk Betondachstein or the construction machinery manufacturer Georg Stetter from Memmingen. In the 1960s, Pablo Picasso's veneration found its way into Berger's formal language, but not into its content. Early on, he dealt with the negative form of the alphabet in a study.
Honors
As a professor emeritus, Berger was made an honorary member of the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich in 2000.
source
- Special guided tour through the exhibition “GERHARD BERGER Painting and Graphics 1960 - 2010” (October 31, 2010 - January 30, 2011) in the Kreisgalerie Schloss Meßkirch on November 21, 2010 under the direction of Gerhard Berger
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Vera Romeu / vr: Gerhard Berger: Vernissage in Messkirch Castle. The eye holds on to the detail . In: Schwäbische Zeitung from November 2, 2010
- ↑ Isabell Michelberger: An enlightening look back . In: Südkurier of November 24, 2010
- ^ A b Edwin Ernst Weber: Gerhard Berger. Painting and graphics 1960 - 2010. Exhibition October 31, 2010 - January 30, 2011 . Edited by the district of Sigmaringen, Department of Culture and Archives, 2010
- ↑ Art. Kreisgalerie shows works by Gerhard Berger . In: Südkurier of October 27, 2010
- ^ Isabell Michelberger / imi: Joy in virtuoso ordered chaos . In: Südkurier of November 3, 2010
- ↑ exhibition. Kreisgalerie shows works by Berger . In: Schwäbische Zeitung from October 28, 2010
- ↑ Birgit Jooss, Sabine Brantl: Honorary Senators and Honorary Members of the Academy of Fine Arts Munich 1808–2008 (PDF)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Berger, Gerhard |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German painter, graphic artist, professor and prorector of the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 17, 1933 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Solothurn |