Otto van Rees (painter)

Otto van Rees (born April 20, 1884 in Freiburg im Breisgau , † May 19, 1957 in Utrecht ) was a Dutch painter.

Wall painting by Otto van Rees in Hottingen (Zurich)

Life

youth

Otto van Rees was born in Freiburg, where his father Jacob van Rees studied from 1883 to 1885. His father was very socially committed. Inspired by the idealistic ideas of Leo Tolstoy , he founded the colony of the International Brotherhood in Blaricum in 1899 . This colony and van Rees' childhood home formed a meeting place for free thinkers, anarchists, philosophers and artists. There were personal relationships between this colony and that of the vegetarians on Monte Verità in Ascona . Van Rees later stayed in Ascona more often. He received his first painting lessons from Jan Toorop and Herman Heijenbrock. When he was seventeen, he met Cathérine Dutilh , a descendant of a Rotterdam merchant family. She had completed an artistic training in Brussels and came to Laren because of her interest in socialism and anarchism . In 1902 Otto van Rees and Cathérine (called Adya) moved into a colony hut in Blaricum.

Domburg and Paris

In 1904 van Rees was called up for military service, but was postponed from conscription. He then worked artistically with Adya in Domburg ; he worked here in a luministic style. As an autodidact , he broke away from traditional notions of art more easily than trained artists. On Toorop's advice, he left Domburg after the summer of 1904 and moved to Paris. In Paris he lived in the Bateau-Lavoir studio complex , where he met Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque . In December 1904, Adya joined him. Both made friends with Kees van Dongen and his family. At the invitation of van Rees, the van Dongen family lived for some time in Fleury-en-Bière near Barbizon . The "free couple" van Rees had rented an old farm there as a summer residence. Van Rees and van Dongen worked here in the neo-impressionist style.

At the end of 1905 the couple lived in Anzio / Italy for a while . There he painted landscapes in the style of Fauvism . In May 1907, van Rees reported to the competent authority to fulfill his postponed military service. In December he was able to leave the army again with a special permit. In the meantime his first pictures had been exhibited in the exhibition of living masters in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. In 1908 van Rees returned to Paris. In 1909, he also married Adya Dutilh before the law.

Van Rees' style of painting changed between 1909 and 1912. Neo-impressionism was abandoned and gave way to a more abstract way of working. George Braque undoubtedly influenced this development. Van Rees was active in the Paris avant-garde scene during this time. The art critic and painter Conrad Kickert (1882–1965) invited to meetings in his house, where avant-gardists such as Otto van Rees, Henri Le Fauconnier , Lodewijk Schelfhout , Piet Mondriaan , Fernand Léger and Jacoba van Heemskerck met regularly. Kickert founded the Modern Art Circle . The aim was to bring the many innovations in painting closer to the Dutch public. The first exhibition in 1911, at which van Rees exhibited, confronted visitors with cubism , fauvism and symbolism . Van Rees' cubist work was also exhibited at exhibitions in Cologne (1912) and Berlin (1913). In 1913 he was represented with three works at the Salon des Indépendants in Paris.

dada

In 1915 van Rees was discharged from military service. He traveled to Ascona, where he joined his wife and children. Back then, Ascona was a popular meeting place for European free spirits. Monte Verità was the name of this colony. During the First World War, the neutrality of Switzerland enabled people to find refuge there who were threatened elsewhere in Europe due to their unconventional views or lifestyles. Van Rees came into contact with Arthur Segal (1875–1944) and Hans Arp (1887–1966). In 1915 Otto and Adya van Rees exhibited together with Hans Arp in the Tanner Gallery in Zurich . Adya showed embroidery based on avant-garde motifs and Otto showed works for which he had used unusual materials such as old newspapers, cardboard and silver paper. The exhibition caused a sensation due to the unconventional character of the works of art on display. Some consider this to be the (otherwise unintended) starting point of Dadaism. The Café Voltaire was the center of the Dadaist movement in Zurich. The often provocative multimedia performances , which were prepared and performed by constantly changing groups of artists, were a protest against the destruction and senselessness of war. Van Rees was one of the regular visitors to the performances. The horrors of the war left a deep impression on Otto and Adya van Rees. Influenced by the ideas of the writer Pieter van der Meer de Walcheren and the French philosopher Jacques Maritain , Adya and later Otto turned to Catholicism . Religious themes then took up a great deal of space in van Rees' paintings.

At the end of 1915 or beginning of 1916, van Rees and Arp worked on wall paintings in the Pestalozzi School in Zurich. These murals were highly valued within the Dada movement and there were sharp protests when they were painted over after a few years. They were not restored until 1957/58. The frescoes can be seen as the first abstract frescoes in Switzerland.

Van Rees signed the Dadaist Manifesto in Berlin in 1918 .

Deurne, Paris and Utrecht

In 1919 the Van Rees family was on their way to Ascona when they were involved in a railway accident in Pont-sur-Yonne . Their daughter Aditya did not survive the accident and van Rees himself was seriously injured. He returned to the Netherlands, where physical recovery took more than a year. He came into contact with painters from the Bergen School, and as a result, his cubist working method gave way to an approach to figurative work.

From 1923 to 1927 the family lived in Deurne (North Brabant) in the Little Castle . Rees and his friend Moissey Kogan (1879–1943) promoted the village doctor Hendrik Wiegersma and helped him develop his artistic talent. In 1922, for example, the Small Castle and Wiegersma House became a meeting place for numerous artists, including Ossip Zadkine , Albert August Plasschaert , Charles-Albert Cingria and Joep Nicolas .

Van Rees frequently commuted between Paris, Ascona and Deurne. In Ascona he joined the artist group Orsa Maggiore (The Great Bear) in 1924 . The van Rees then built a house in Losone , not far from Ascona.

At the urging of his wife, who felt constrained by life in Deurne, he moved to Brasschaat, Belgium in 1927 . They lived there only a short time. In 1928 they left for Paris. Van Rees was included in the anti- surrealist movement (Cercle et Carré). Abstract compositions then predominate in van Rees' work. Due to the economic crisis of 1929, the van Rees family got into financial difficulties. Jobs rarely came in and there was less support from family members. The relationship between Otto and Adya came under pressure. Van Rees initially moved through the country without permanent residence. His wife and son lived alternately in Paris and Ascona.

In the mid-1930s, Van Rees spent more and more time in the Netherlands. Through his son-in-law Louis Kuitenbrouwer (pseudonym Albert Kuyle ) he had access to a studio in Utrecht at Oudegracht 55. He shared the space with other artists such as Gerrit Rietveld and Ries Mulder. The studio was above the publishing office of the magazine Die Gemeinschaft , a monthly magazine for Catholic reconstruction. Albert Kuyle was the editorial secretary of this magazine. Otto van Rees was involved in this magazine as a designer. When his son-in-law left "Die Gemeinschaft" and founded the fascist-oriented "Neue Gemeinschaft", he also provided illustrations for it, but without adopting its ideological orientation. During this time in Utrecht, van Rees concentrated primarily on painting: portraits, still lifes and religious images were created. Among other things, he took care of a wall decoration in the Amsterdam Obrechtkirche. He joined the society "Kunstliefde (art love)" and exhibited in the Wagenaar art hall. In Utrecht he met Manna Smitt, who became known as an artist under the name of Micha Landt and who became famous for her flower still lifes. However, he remained married to Adya Dutilh. In 1935 he traveled with Kuyle to various places on the Mediterranean. This trip inspired Kuyles to write his book "Land des Durstes", for which van Rees provided the illustrations. During the Second World War he stayed regularly with Micha Landt in Limburg .

After 1945 van Rees no longer came to the fore. In 1950 one of his works was part of the Dutch contribution to the Esposizione Internazionale di Arte Sacra 1900-1950 in Rome. In 1951, the relationship with Micha Landt was broken off and some time later Adya van Rees rejoined her husband. From 1952 van Rees could count on financial support from the government in recognition of his importance for Dutch art. In 1953 and 1955 he traveled to Yugoslavia and Greece . These trips inspired him to new works. In 1956, a retrospective of his works was shown at the Museum of New Religious Art in Utrecht, which was positively received by critics.

In 1957 Otto van Rees died as a result of a traffic accident. Adya van Rees died in 1959.

He played an important role in Dutch art not only because of his work, in which there was plenty of room for experimentation, but also as a facilitator. His artistic network was extensive, especially at the time when the European avant-garde was breaking new ground. Through his personal contacts, people in the Netherlands were able to take note of these new developments. After his death, the heirs set up the Van Rees Stichting (van Rees Foundation) in order to preserve the cultural heritage of his life.

literature

• Ida Boelema, Irène Lesparre (red). Otto van Rees . Uitgeverij Waanders, Zwolle / Van Rees Stichting, De Bilt 2005.
• Francisca van Vloten: Misunderstanding of het modernisme. Otto van Rees (1884-1957) in het Singer Museum te Laren . In: Zeeuws Tijdschrift 2003/1, pp. 2–7
• Laura Grijns: Otto van Rees, 1884-1957, Verkenner van het modernisme , Bulletin Singer Museum, no.16, January 2003
• Laura N. Grijns: Rees, Otto van (1884-1957) . In: Biografisch Woordenboek van Nederland ( digitized ).

Web links

• Otto van Rees. Biographical data and works in the Netherlands Institute for Art History (Dutch)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Website van de Van Rees Stichting