Heinrich Ehmsen

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Grave of Heinrich Ehmsen in the Dorotheenstädtischer Friedhof in Berlin

Heinrich Ehmsen (born August 9, 1886 in Kiel , † May 6, 1964 in East Berlin ) was a German painter and graphic artist .

Life

Teaching, arts and crafts school

Heinrich Ehmsen - the son of a basket maker and his wife - started a four-year apprenticeship as a room painter in 1901 after completing primary school. At the same time he attended the municipal trade school in Kiel, where he - at times together with Friedrich Peter Drömmer , Werner Lange and Karl Peter Röhl - had an arts and crafts training from Gerd Zimmermann.

With the help of a scholarship, Heinrich Ehmsen was able to train as a decorative painter from 1906 to 1909 at the Düsseldorf School of Applied Arts with Peter Behrens , Fritz Helmuth Ehmcke and JLM Lauweriks . In 1909 Ehmsen designed a room together with Lauweriks for the Düsseldorf exhibition Christian Art .

Paris, Académie Colarossi and Café du Dôme

During a stay in Paris from 1910 to 1911, Ehmsen studied at the Académie Colarossi , and in the Café du Dôme he had contacts with Ernesto de Fiori , Jules Pascin and Alfred Flechtheim .

Munich

In 1911 Ehmsen moved to Munich , where he was influenced by the painters of the Neue Künstlervereinigung München and the Blauer Reiter . He maintained contact in particular with Marianne von Werefkin and Alexej Jawlensky .

First World War

From 1914 to 1918 Ehmsen was stationed as a soldier in France , Romania and Flanders during the First World War . His impressions from the years 1918 to 1919 during the conflicts and the disintegration of the Munich Soviet Republic are reflected in many of his works.

1920s

In 1919 Ehmsen joined the November Group . In 1920 he applied to the Munich Police Department for a residence permit for Werefkin, Jawlensky, Helene Nesnakomoff and Andreas Jawlensky , which gave them the opportunity to close their Munich apartment. On March 24, 1921, Ehmsen entered himself in Heinrich Kirchhoff's guest book in Wiesbaden as a painter who lived in Munich . In the summer of 1921, Jawlensky rented Ehmsen's apartment in Munich and from there he was sure to visit Paul Klee , who was then living in Possenhofen on Lake Starnberg . After an extensive trip to Martigues in southern France in 1928 , Ehmsen moved to Berlin in 1929 .

1930s

In 1930 he became a member of the fighting committee of artists and intellectual workers to support the KPD in the Reichstag elections . From 1932 to 1933 he stayed in the USSR , where he had an exhibition in Moscow and his works were bought by museums.

Until his arrest by the Gestapo on October 18, 1933, Ehmsen was an artistic assistant at the Junkers factory. Friedrich Peter Drömmers arranged the job for him. During his detention in the Columbiahaus in Berlin, his works were removed from all German museums. Although eight works were shown in the “ Degenerate Art ” exhibition in 1937 , they were accepted into the Reich Chamber of Culture in 1939 .

1940s

From 1940 to 1944 he was a soldier in the Wehrmacht . He was employed in the Propaganda Department of the French Military Commander (MBF), which received its instructions from the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda and from the MBF jointly. Lieutenant Ehmsen, responsible for the fine arts, was a "comrade" of Lieutenant Gerhard Heller, who was responsible for censorship in the literature department, and organized the trip for French writers to the 1941 Weimar poets' meeting with him . In 1941 he organized a trip to Germany for French painters and sculptors, among them André Derain and Maurice de Vlaminck . The Breker exhibition in Paris, however, was not organized by Ehmsen, but by Karl Epting and the German Institute .

After the Second World War

In 1945 Ehmsen - together with Karl Hofer - was one of the founders of the University of Fine Arts in Berlin-Charlottenburg , of which he was the deputy director and head of the Free Art department. He was dismissed in 1949 because of a declaration of solidarity for the Paris Congrès mondial des partisans pour la paix (World Peace Movement ). In 1950 Ehmsen became a full member of the German Academy of the Arts in East Berlin and took over the master class for painting.

Heinrich Ehmsen was married to Liz Bertram.

estate

His estate is now kept at the Akademie der Künste Berlin , including seven paintings.

Award

Works (selection)

Works in public collections

Exhibitions

literature

  • Knut Nievers (Ed.): Kunstwende. The Kiel impulse of Expressionism 1915–1922. Wachholtz, Neumünster 1992, ISBN 3-529-02728-6 .
  • Short biography for:  Ehmsen, Heinrich . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
  • Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer: Heinrich Ehmsen . In: ders .: Kiel artist. Volume 3: In the Weimar Republic and National Socialism 1918-1945 , Heide: Boyens 2019 (special publications by the Society for Kiel City History; 88), ISBN 978-3-8042-1493-4 , pp. 167-183.
  • Ehmsen, Heinrich . In: Hans Vollmer (Hrsg.): General Lexicon of Fine Artists of the XX. Century. tape 2 : E-J . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1955, p. 18 .

Web links

Commons : Heinrich Ehmsen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Knut Nievers (Ed.): Kunstwende. The Kiel impulse of Expressionism 1915-1922 . Wachholtz, Neumünster 1992, p. 203.
  2. ↑ Katja Förster, Stefan Frey: “In intimate friendship”, Alexej Jawlensky, Paul and Lily Klee, Marianne Werefkin. Zurich 2013, p. 260
  3. ↑ Bernd Fäthke: Alexej Jawlensky, drawing - graphics - documents. Exhib. Cat .: Museum Wiesbaden 1983, Cat .: No. 92, p. 54.
  4. ↑ Katja Förster, Stefan Frey: “In intimate friendship”, Alexej Jawlensky, Paul and Lily Klee, Marianne Werefkin. Zurich 2013, p. 264.
  5. ↑ Reinhold Heller, Heinrich Ehmsen, in exh. Cat .: From Expressionism to Resistance Art in Germany 1909–1936. The Marvin and Janet Fischmann Collection. Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt 1991, p. 170.
  6. ^ Armin Second: Fritz Hofmann and the Municipal Gallery 1937 - A National Socialist Museum Career, Its Prehistory and Consequences. In: exhib. Cat .: The "Art City" Munich, National Socialism and "Degenerate Art". State Gallery of Modern Art, Munich 1987, pp. 262, 278
  7. ↑ a b Knut Nievers (Ed.): Kunstwende. The Kiel impulse of Expressionism 1915–1922. Wachholtz, Neumünster 1992, p. 204.
  8. ^ Katrin Engel: German cultural policy in occupied Paris 1940–1944: Film and theater. Oldenbourg, Munich 2003, p. 131.
  9. ^ Katrin Engel: German cultural policy in occupied Paris 1940–1944: Film and theater. Oldenbourg, Munich 2003, p. 257.
  10. ^ Art collection: Heinrich Ehmsen , at the Academy of the Arts
  11. ↑ Ingeborg Michailoff: Heinrich Ehmsen 1888–1964. Painting. Memorial exhibition from the artist's estate. State Museum, Schwerin 1968.
personal data
SURNAME Ehmsen, Heinrich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ehmsen, Heinz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter and graphic artist
DATE OF BIRTH August 9, 1886
PLACE OF BIRTH Kiel
DATE OF DEATH May 6, 1964
Place of death Berlin