Kate Diehn-Bitt

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Kate Diehn-Bitt (born February 12, 1900 in Schöneberg near Berlin ; † October 23, 1978 in Rostock ; born Käthe (Kate) Bitt ) was a German painter .

Life

On February 12, 1900 in Schöneberg b. Berlin born as Käthe Bitt. In 1901 her mother Elsa Bitt, née Rudloff, married the Jewish pharmacist and chemist Leo Glaser from Bad Doberan . There Kate attended the secondary school for girls. From 1914 to around 1916 she received drawing lessons from the former Corinth student Rudolf Sieger (1867–1925). At the age of sixteen, Kate moved into her grandparents' house in Rostock and received private lessons in art and literary history.

In 1919 she married the Rostock dentist Paul Diehn (Pieter). Their son Jürnjakob was born in 1920. From 1923 to around 1925 Kate Diehn-Bitt was in contact with Emil Orlik ; he advises her to study nature honestly and to draw in front of the mirror. 1929–1931 she began studying at the private art academy in Dresden , a painting and drawing school founded by Ernst Oskar Simonson-Castelli (1864–1929). Here Woldemar Winkler becomes her teacher as well as the former Kokoschka student Willy Kriegel .

The artist set up her first studio in 1933 at the Rostock Brink and took part in exhibitions. Her images of man from the thirties are particularly impressive with their clear structure, restrained colors and profound competence, which represent Kate Diehn-Bitt's decisive character as a motif for her works. Attacks by the Nazis on her paintings begin. Leo Glaser escapes the Holocaust by marrying a Christian woman and, after the death of his wife, goes to his daughter Lili Hahn in the USA and dies there in 1947.

In 1935 she had her first and, for the time being, last public solo exhibition together with her friend, the sculptor Hertha von Guttenberg , in the gallery of Wolfgang Gurlitt in Berlin. This has the consequence that her art is ostracized as "degenerate" and a painting and drawing ban is imposed on her.

Apparently inevitably she lives withdrawn, but continues to work with the help of friends and painter colleagues. Hans Emil Oberländer and Heinrich Engel bring colors to their studio, while others bring paper, cardboard and pens. Painting grounds are often used on both sides. She paints self-portraits, portraits of her relatives and friends, views from the window at the Brink, pets, plants and generalizations, subjects from her limited area. In addition to her oil paintings, there are drawings in pencil and chalk, and watercolors, which are often carried by disturbing personal experiences.

When the constant pressure of defamation of Kate Diehn-Bitt had been relieved and the prerequisites had been met, in 1945 she became chairman of the visual arts section in the Rostock cultural association. She actively participates in the cultural development, takes part in the first two art exhibitions in Dresden. In 1946 she co-founded the visual arts section in the FDGB . What was artistically created in the first post-war years was partly shaped by lasting, often very dark memories and thoughts of the war years. Kate Diehn-Bitt is still building on the future.

Her first solo exhibition follows in the State Museum in Schwerin . Despite positive reviews, the cultural-political label “not forward-looking and optimistic” is attached to it. Most people then tried, more or less deliberately, to forget the horrors they had experienced. You didn't want to be reminded of it.

In the early 1950s, however, Kate Diehn-Bitt largely withdrew from public life and resigned from all functions. It deals with the Old Testament and with the Thomas Mann work "Joseph and his brothers". The attention to literature is striking, she reads a lot during this time. She is particularly concerned with the fate of the Jews. Kate Diehn-Bitt's stepfather was Jewish and many of his relatives perished in the concentration camps .

She processes the design principles of ancient Egyptian wall painting. She creates biblical scenes with collages. The “Diary of Childhood” is also created with 30 colored pencil drawings. The Italian gallery owner Betonati purchases drawings by the artist. On the initiative of the sculptor Jo Jastram , the painter Lothar Mannewitz and the scientist Regel, exhibitions are held in 1968 in the exhibition center of the Ernst Moritz Arndt University of Greifswald and in the Museum Stralsund .

This is followed by exhibitions in the Kunsthalle Rostock , further in the galleries “Tip-Galerie” and “Arkade” in Berlin, “Galerie am Boulevard” in Rostock, “Galerie im Friedländer Tor” in Neubrandenburg , in the art service of the Evangelical Church Erfurt (Augustinian Monastery Erfurt ) and in the "Galerie am Kamp" in Bad Doberan. One speaks of a rediscovery of the artist.

After suffering from severe typhoid fever in 1946 and a temporary restriction of mobility, Kate Diehn-Bitt fell into a deep psychological crisis from which she tried to work herself out, completely changed artistically. After the death of her husband, the disease increases sharply, but up to four collages are still formed daily on the sick bed. Kate Diehn-Bitt dies on October 23, 1978 in the Rostock Clinic in Gehlsdorf .

In 2000, on her 100th birthday, an exhibition took place in the Red Pavilion in Bad Doberan and in the St. Mary's Church in Rostock. The large and necessary retrospective was then opened in September 2002 in the Kunsthalle Rostock. An accompanying volume was published for this. Further exhibitions followed in 2003 in the Kunstkaten Ahrenshoop , in 2006 in the Galerie Hebecker in Weimar and in 2016 in the Kunstmuseum Ahrenshoop , where part of her artistic estate is located.

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personal data
SURNAME Diehn request, Kate
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bitt, Käthe (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter
DATE OF BIRTH February 12, 1900
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH October 23, 1978
Place of death Rostock