Kurt Schmidt (painter)

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Kurt Schmidt (born March 10, 1901 in Limbach / Saxony , † May 9, 1991 in Gera ) was a German painter , graphic artist and draftsman .

life and work

Kurt Schmidt, born as the son of a teacher, graduated from the Herzogliche Christians-Gymnasium in Eisenberg in 1919 and began studying at the arts and crafts school in Hamburg in the same year . While still at school he took lessons from the painter Paul Neidhardt . Through the poet and philosopher Paul Bommersheim and the influence of Herwarth Walden , he was introduced to the work of newer artists, including those of the “ Blue Rider ”. He then showed particular interest in the works of Lyonel Feininger .

At the suggestion of fellow students, in 1920 he switched to a five-year course at the Bauhaus in Weimar , where he turned to abstract painting and attended a preliminary course with Johannes Itten . Schmidt then became an apprentice in the workshops of Wassily Kandinsky and Oskar Schlemmer in 1921 . There he dealt with stage and wall painting as well as with drafts and choreographies on the subject of "mechanical stage". For the Bauhaus exhibition in 1923 he designed a window wall and developed the mechanical ballet together with Georg Teltscher and FW Bogler . This had its world premiere on August 17, 1923 in Jena as part of the exhibition. (See below) He then made drafts and marionettes for the fairy tale play The Adventures of the Little Hunchback , which are now in the Puppet Theater Collection in Dresden. Also in 1924 he designed and choreographed the dance game Der Mann am Schaltbrett , which was performed for the 5th anniversary of the Bauhaus Weimar . After his teacher Itten left and the Bauhaus moved to Dessau , Schmidt also left Weimar. He first went to Stuttgart , where he studied with Adolf Hölzel in 1927 (other sources mention 1928) and in 1929 to Gera . As part of the National Socialist campaign “ Degenerate Art ”, Schmidt was defamed by confiscating two figurines he had designed. They were shown in the Leipzig exhibition in 1938.

During the Second World War he fought between 1941 and 1945, first on the Eastern Front and later in Normandy , where he was taken prisoner by the English and spent in the Cultybraggan POW camp near the Scottish village of Comrie until he was released . A large part of his early artistic work was lost in the turmoil of the war.

Back from captivity, Schmidt slowly began to be artistically active again and until 1966 only worked sporadically and part-time with watercolors and colored chalk drawings. His main job was from 1951 to 1960 as a furniture painter in the Geras wood industry. Theoretically, he dealt with Kandinsky and examined psychological and symbolic questions of form and color. At the suggestion of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden , he made replicas of the lost Bauhaus works from 1970 to 1972 ; the glass pictures that have been created in several work phases since 1976 form a continuous sequence. From 1973 onwards, stimulated by musical compositions, he occupied himself with a graphic cycle. In 1976 he was awarded the medal for the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Bauhaus Dessau. From 1985 he was a member of the Association of Visual Artists of the GDR .

"The mechanical ballet"

Three of the five figurines in the reconstruction of the Theater der Klänge from 1987 (recorded in 2009). The picture shows v. l. No. the figurines "machine being", "locomotive" and "windmill". One of the figurines is danced by a dancer. Here v. l. No. Laura Wissing, Kai Bettermann, Jacqueline Fischer

Kurt Schmidt worked with his fellow students Georg Teltscher and FW Bogler (figurine construction) for the Bauhaus exhibition (then called "Bauhaus Week") in 1923 on a play that was to be premiered on August 17, 1923 in the Jena City Theater in the evening "The mechanical cabaret". On the eve was in the German National Theater in Weimar , the Triadic Ballet by Oskar Schlemmer shown in the following days was followed by evening concerts and -Matineen with pieces of Paul Hindemith , Ferruccio Busoni , Ernst Krenek and Igor Stravinsky .

Hans Heinz Stuckenschmidt , who wrote the original music for this stage play, reports on “man-high constructions made of cardboard, wire, canvas and wood, all in basic geometric shapes: circles, triangles, squares, rectangles, trapezoids and of course in the primary colors yellow, red and Blue. ”( Hans Heinz Stuckenschmidt : Musik am Bauhaus) Schmidt and his two fellow students attached the figurine parts to themselves with leather straps so that they could no longer be seen behind them. They wore black jerseys underneath. A two-dimensional dance followed, in which only the attached figurines could be seen, but the “dancers” behind them remained invisible. The dancers were only allowed to move sideways and not turn, so that only the painted side of the figurines remained facing the audience.

There were five figurines in total:

  • The Mechanical Engineering was marked by the technological age. Characterized by movement work and resistance work, it moved monotonously to a steady rhythm without changing the speed. The movements were precise, jerky and motorized. The figurine itself consisted of two different sized squares of different sizes. The color scheme was based on white and red shapes. She had a red body with a white arm, a yellow left arm and blue and orange legs.
  • The dance figure , on the other hand, was completely focused on the dance . It was accompanied by jazz music and formed a contrast to the other figurines.
  • One figurine was equipped with long wing-like arms, which gave it the character of a windmill . She had a blue body with a red and a yellow rectangular arm. The legs were designed in orange and green.
  • Opposite her stood the figurine, which looked like a locomotive and was also called that. It acted as a harmonious focal point for mechanical engineering and the windmill. It had a green body with an orange shape from the floor to the top. There was also a blue “horizontal shape” in dark blue with white and green ends.
  • A miniature figurine was used for contrast and animation. It consisted of a head and leg shape on a rectangular surface. The rectangle was white, the head and foot were pink. There was also a black arm.

Stuckenschmidt reports that this dance was geometrically very strict and was accompanied by him improvising on a piano. He tried to accompany the geometric movements with a "primitive accompanying music", which consists of linked triads and elements from folk songs, dance and marching music. He oriented himself on the music of George Antheil .

After two to three weeks of daily rehearsals, the piece was fully rehearsed. For the performance, the stage was also completely lined in black so that the dancers could completely disappear behind the figurines. The piece was danced by Schmidt, Teltscher and Bogler, as well as five other students. After the performance in Jena in front of masters, journeymen and some foreign guests, Paul Klee and his wife as well as Oskar Schlemmer were enthusiastic. Stuckenschmidt himself was somewhat disappointed; he perceived his music as “primitive music for everyday use” and saw clear artistic distances to Schlemmer's ideas of dance and scene.

After the performance in Jena, the piece was presented to the German Werkbund in Weimar in August 1923 . A performance in the Berlin Philharmonic followed in 1924 . One of the results of the premiere was the founding of the stage class at the Bauhaus by Oskar Schlemmer.

In 1987, the Düsseldorf Theater of Sounds was the first theater in 64 years to develop a new production. Since then, over 200 performances have followed with reconstructed figurines (made of wood) in a new choreography by Jörg Udo Lensing to a newly composed music by Hanno Spelsberg. As early as 1988 the mechanical ballet was shown in this new version on the stage at the Bauhaus Dessau. Kurt Schmidt himself saw a performance on June 3, 1990 in the Stadttheater Gera.

Exhibitions

literature

  • Art collection Gera (ed.): Kurt Schmidt and avant-garde artists, from Kandinsky to Vasarely. For the exhibition “Encounter Bauhaus. Kurt Schmidt and avant-garde artists from Kandinsky to Vasarely ”. Art collection Gera, Orangery March 25 to June 28, 2009. ISBN 978-3-910051-52-2 .
  • Claudia Timm (ed.): Intermedial experiments at the Bauhaus: Kurt Schmidt and the synthesis of the arts. Art collection Gera, Gera [2019], ISBN 978-3-910051-63-8 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ SLUB Dresden: estate of the Bauhaus artist Kurt Schmidt - Mscr.Dresd.App.2146. Retrieved on February 2, 2018 (German).
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h Staatlicher Kunsthandel der DDR (Ed.): Kurt Schmidt. Painting. Graphic. Drawings. Exhibition 1986. 1986.
  3. ↑ a b c d e Eckhard Neumann: Bauhaus and Bauhausler: Memories and Confessions . Erw. Neuausg edition. DuMont, Cologne 1985, ISBN 3-7701-1673-9 , pp. 123 ff .
  4. ^ Schmidt Art Auctions Dresden. Retrieved February 2, 2018 .
  5. ↑ The mechanical ballet - theater of sounds. Retrieved on February 2, 2018 (German).
  6. ↑ Karin Ulrike Soika for Creatix - http://www.creatix.org : Kurt Schmidt - Pabst Collection - Classical Modern and Contemporary Art. Retrieved February 2, 2018 .
  7. ^ Schmidt Art Auctions Dresden. Retrieved February 2, 2018 .
  8. ^ Hans Heinz Stuckenschmidt: Music at the Bauhaus . Lecture given at the Bauhaus Archive in Berlin on May 11, 1976. Ed .: Hans M. Wingler. Bauhaus Archive, Berlin 1978, p. 16-19 .
  9. ^ A b c Hans Heinz Stuckenschmidt: Music at the Bauhaus . Lecture given at the Bauhaus Archive in Berlin on May 11, 1976. Ed .: Hans M. Wingler. Bauhaus Archive, Berlin 1978, p. 6th f .
  10. ↑ a b Stuckenschmidt (1978): p. 9
  11. ↑ The mechanical Bauhaus stage. In: theaterderklaenge.de. Accessed April 14, 2019 (German).
  12. ↑ Theater of Sounds Diary. In: theater-der-klaenge.de. www.theater-der-klaenge.de, accessed on April 14, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Schmidt, Kurt
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter
DATE OF BIRTH March 10, 1901
PLACE OF BIRTH Limbach (Saxony)
DATE OF DEATH May 9, 1991
Place of death Gera