Werner Petzold

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Werner Petzold (born March 5, 1940 in Leipzig ) is a German painter and graphic artist . He worked as a lecturer in the GDR and received extensive orders as a painter from the Soviet-German stock corporation Wismut for the production of pictures that were supposed to convey a positive mood towards the socialist system. His art during this time is assigned to socialist realism . Since his escape to the Federal Republic in 1983 , he has devoted himself above all to the design of altarpieces and church windows.

Life

After training as a lithographer from 1954 to 1957, Petzold studied graphics and painting with Bernhard Heisig from 1959 at the Leipzig School of Graphics and Book Art . He was also a student of Wolfgang Mattheuer and Werner Tübke . He received his degree in 1964. From 1967 on he was a member of the Association of Visual Artists of the GDR . From 1971 to 1980 he worked as a lecturer at the technical college for advertising and design in Berlin-Oberschöneweide and was among other things the assistant to Heinz Wagner from 1969 to 1971 . Since 1971 he has been working as a freelance artist. From 1974 on he was head of the support class for graphics and painting in Gera . In 1981 he was the artistic director of the 1st International Symposium for Painters and Graphic Artists in Zinnowitz . From 1968 to 1983 Petzold worked for the Wismut art collection and developed into its most important painter.

During a stay in Romania in 1983, he took the opportunity to flee to western Germany and, according to his own statements, became a cultural employee in the evangelical "Christian Youth Village Frechen " in 1984 and in the following year an artistic employee for art on the construction of a company in Osnabrück . In the 1990s he designed many windows and altarpieces in churches . He worked on Lake Constance and in Hanover , after the fall of the Wall he moved to reunified Berlin .

Act

His first commissioned work for the Soviet-German stock corporation Wismut was created around 1969/1970. The 1 by 0.75 meter portrait of a friend , painted in oil on canvas, was very well received by the government. The second work commissioned by SDAG Wismut is the painting Brigade Rose from 1970. It has a square format measuring 2.40 by 2.40 meters and is made in oil on hardboard. The subject is the world of mining. In the center it shows a group of seated and standing miners who turn towards the viewer. All figures wear work clothes with helmets and sturdy boots. In the interests of the client, they should serve to illustrate the ideal type of socialist GDR worker. The work is in the art collection of the former SDAG Wismut, today Wismut GmbH with headquarters in Chemnitz . In 2013 it was one of the works of the Wismut art collection, which were presented in the “Layer in the Shaft” show in the Neue Sächsische Galerie in Chemnitz.

Large picture The peaceful use of nuclear energy

One of his best-known and largest works in terms of area is the monumental painting The Peaceful Use of Nuclear Power (sometimes also referred to as The Peaceful Use of Nuclear Energy ), created as a facade design . The 16 x 12 meter and 2.5 tonne exterior mural created on behalf of the uranium mining company Wismut from 1972 to 1974 is a burn-in painting on 384 enamelled steel sheets so that it can better withstand environmental and weather influences . The picture shows miners, engineers and other people in everyday family life waving a red flag and grouping around a central atomic nucleus. The image idealizes and glorifies the peaceful use of nuclear power . During the GDR era, the picture was attached to the outer facade of the four-story administration building of the Paitzdorf mining company . When the mining company closed, the picture initially ended up in the depot. Since September 5, 2009 it has been set up on an open space in Löbichau ( Lage ) near Ronneburg . The picture also adorned the cover of the LP On Friendship Course from 1975.

In addition to various exhibitions in the GDR, Petzold's works have also been shown internationally in Warsaw , Krakow , Moscow , Novosibirsk , Plovdiv and Pécs . In the Federal Republic he exhibited from 1983 in Stuttgart , Bonn , Frechen , Osnabrück , Hanover and Berlin.

reception

During his creative period in the GDR, Werner Petzold's pictorial works primarily dealt with the function of the worker, who played a special role in the GDR and which was even described and laid down in Article 1 of the GDR constitution . Petzold painted both figurative and abstract, mostly large-format pictures. The motifs of his artistic work in the former GDR, which saw itself as a “workers and peasants state”, originate predominantly from the working class and should in principle convey a positive mood towards the socialist system. The GDR government used his representations for propaganda purposes, among other things . He is considered a "moderate apologist of the party course" of the SED . His art during this period is assigned to the style of socialist realism .

Farewell to Icarus in an exhibition curated by Paul Kaiser . Imagery in the GDR , which was on view in the Neues Museum Weimar from October 18, 2012 to February 3, 2013 , showed Kaiser how the working class stepped into the limelight of art production in several ways. The GDR leadership wanted the worker hero to become an intellectual planner of the “scientific-technical revolution”, but at the same time not lose his typical habitual basic equipment. For example, show Petzold's picture, completed in 1972, See great things are done! (Victory of the socialist relations of production) the turn to this type. Here, too, the bundling of tried and tested physical equipment and newly acquired technological championships is boldly highlighted, as the GDR art historian Peter H. Feist called for in 1966 and, for example, elevated “electric calculators instead of shovel handles” to the visual attributes of the working class.

On the occasion of the exhibition Shift in the Shaft 2013 in Chemnitz and Gera, the art historian Doris Weilandt wrote in the catalog for the exhibition about the murals and a. from Werner Petzold that they play a central role as "exemplary program images" of the Wismut corporate philosophy.

Works (selection)

  • 1967: Tower of Work (assembly worker) , 2.51 × 1.19 meters, picture on wood, hardboard, metal with paint
  • 1970: Painting 2.4 × 2.4 meters: Brigade Rose
  • 1972: See great things are done! (Victory of the socialist relations of production) , 1.54 × 2.38 meters, oil painting on hardboard
  • 1972–1974: Exterior mural 16 × 12 meters: The peaceful use of nuclear power / The peaceful use of nuclear energy
  • 1975: 1.92 × 1.90 meters: In the depth
  • 1981–1982: Large relief 12 × 3.80 meters for a concert hall in Zinnowitz
  • 1987: Exterior wall design at the business school in Überlingen
  • 1992: Winged altar 4.20 × 3.60 meters Friedenskirche in Unterlüß
  • 1995: Altarpiece 3.25 × 4.24 meters in St. John's Church in Otternhagen
  • 1996: Church window in the Friedenskirche in Unterlüß
  • 1997: Winged altar in the collegiate church in Münchehagen
  • 1998: Church window in the Johanniskapelle in Adendorf
  • 2000: Panel painting 3.60 × 10 meters for "Trader Vic's" in Palo Alto
  • 2002: Altar wall design in the Church of the Holy Cross in Stuhr-Brinkum
  • 2003: Winged altar for the Maria Magdalena Church in Lauenhagen

literature

Web links

Commons : Werner Petzold  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ eART.de: Werner Petzold , accessed on September 17, 2019
  2. ^ Petzold, Werner: Portrait of a buddy , 1970, photo library
  3. ↑ Werner Petzold, Brigade Rose , 1970: The group portrait in the modern age (1860–1970) , dissertation by Anna Maria Thiess, Munich 2018. pp. 83–95.
  4. ↑ Der Tagesspiegel : Ulrike Uhlig: The collection of bismuth. Controversial art from the "State within the State" of the GDR , article from December 4, 2013, accessed on October 10, 2019
  5. ↑ Ostthüringer Zeitung : Bild im Wind between Ronneburg and Schmölln , article from February 18, 2014, accessed on September 17, 2019
  6. ^ Altenburger Land district: Re-inauguration of the large picture "The peaceful use of nuclear energy" in Löbichau , article from September 12, 2009, accessed on September 18, 2019
  7. ↑ Martin Maleschka: GDR. Building related art. Art in public space 1950 to 1990. DOM Publishers, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-86922-581-4 , pp. 452–453.
  8. ^ Deutsches Historisches Museum : Record cover On the Course of Friendship (inventory number T 90 / 112.2), accessed on October 10, 2019
  9. ↑ Werner Petzold, Brigade Rose , 1970: The group portrait in the modern age (1860–1970) , dissertation by Anna Maria Thiess, Munich 2018. p. 85.
  10. ^ Ingo Arend: Pinakothek der Sonnensucher , TAZ, October 29, 2013
  11. ^ Rehberg, Holler, Kaiser (ed.): Farewell to Icarus. Imagery in the GDR. Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-86335-224-0 , p. 170 ( digital copy online )
  12. ↑ Oliver Sukrow: Review of: "Layer in the shaft" , in: Sehepunkte Issue 14 (2014), No. 6
  13. ↑ Wilfried Manneke: Good Shepherd, Braune Wölfe , bene !, Munich 2019, ISBN 978-3-96340-080-3 , p. 23
  14. ^ The altarpiece by Werner Petzold in the Otternhagen church, website of the Ev. Lutheran Johannes-Kirchengemeinde
  15. ^ Altar designs and glass artists, Art Department of the Ev-luth. Regional Church of Hanover
personal data
SURNAME Petzold, Werner
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German painter and graphic artist
DATE OF BIRTH March 5, 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig