Wieland Förster

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Wieland Förster, 2010

Wieland Förster (born February 12, 1930 in Dresden ) is a German sculptor , draftsman , painter and writer .

Life

Childhood and youth

Wieland Förster was born in Dresden-Laubegast as the fifth and last child of a driver and a commercial clerk . In 1935 his father died of a war disease. As a result, the family ran into financial hardship, which could be overcome mainly through the care of the mother. She succeeded in keeping the children away from the indoctrination of the National Socialists . Her son Wieland rejected the Nazi system and refused to uniform himself and take part in the required services. From 1936 to 1944 he attended elementary school .

In 1944 he started an apprenticeship as a technical draftsman and pipelayer at the waterworks of the city of Dresden. After a four-week prison camp for the Hitler Youth, he volunteered as an air raid helper in order to evade any further service with impunity. Dealing with technology during his apprenticeship brought him forward by leaps and bounds, so that at the end of the first year of his apprenticeship he was delegated to the preparatory class of the engineering school. Drafted into the Volkssturm , Förster suffered a war trauma during an Allied attack on October 7, 1944 and later experienced the major attack by American and English bombers on Dresden on February 13, 1945 . In the chaos after the attack, he withdrew from the Volkssturm and stayed in his residential area until the end of the war on May 8, 1945. After the profession of technical draftsman had been declared a women's profession, he had to continue his apprenticeship as a pipelayer.

On September 17, 1946, a communist district administrator had him handed over to the Soviet NKVD for alleged possession of weapons, in order to get possession of the Förster family's apartment and to remove him as a witness to his criminal activities . After three months of nocturnal interrogation, Förster was sentenced by a Soviet military tribunal (SMT) to 7 ½ years of forced labor in Siberia in mid-December , but found unfit for transport because of his emaciation and deported to the Soviet special camp No. 4 Bautzen . There he fell ill a. a. of tuberculosis and was released on January 21, 1950 after the International Red Cross threatened to inspect files about a "back exit" without papers and an official pardon.

"In Bautzen, in view of the enormous death rate of mostly innocent prisoners, he vowed to secure the survival of these victims of political arbitrariness, in whatever form, by warning and commemoration, which he wanted to implement in artistic form."

education and study

In 1950 Wieland Förster passed the examination as a technical draftsman for mechanical engineering , but worked in the planning department of the waterworks until 1953 . During this time he tried numerous artistic forms of expression (writing, music, theater, advertising). In the fall of 1952 he finally took part in the public evening act at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts , whose teachers supported this endeavor.

After his company refused to delegate him to the Dresden University of Fine Arts because of “bourgeoisisation”, Förster took the entrance exam for the course on his own responsibility. In the fall of 1953 he began studying sculpture with Walter Arnold , and his assistants Gerd Jaeger and Hans Steger . The training in Dresden was aimed at a neoclassical program of forms, based on the obligatory drawing lessons based on plaster casts and nature as well as anatomy and art history studies .

Already at the beginning of the second year of studies, Wieland Förster sought contact with representatives of the forbidden “classical modernism”, visited Bernhard Heiliger in West Berlin. Walter Arnold, himself a knowledgeable craftsman, helped a few students whom he trusted politically, with the help of his experiences with Hermann Haller and Charles Despiau , to deepen their view of the essence of figurative sculpture. For the “Portrait after Photo” task in the third year of studies, Förster chose Bertolt Brecht , who was ostracized at the time and whom he was able to experience shortly before his death in 1956 at the rehearsals for Galilei's life at the Berliner Ensemble .

In 1958, when he graduated, he applied for a three-year master's studio at the German Academy of the Arts in East Berlin with Gustav Seitz , who, however, went to Hamburg in the same year. In order to be allowed to stay in Berlin, he reluctantly accepted his advice and in 1959 became a master student of Fritz Cremer .

After 18 months, in 1961, his master class time was terminated prematurely because of "formalism". He was allowed to perform his larger-than-life group of figures “Friendship of the Nations among Students” in a studio of the academy, 1961/62 (competition prize of the Technical University ) for Dresden.

Artistic work

In complete seclusion, Wieland Förster created the opportunity to build up his sculptural work in a Berlin shop from 1961. In 1991 he had to relocate his 16 m 2 large plaster of paris to a backyard, where his late work was created after a serious heart disease. He worked the large sandstone sculptures on his property near Oranienburg in Brandenburg.

Wieland Förster has been a full member of the Academy of the Arts of the GDR since 1974 and was its 5th Vice President from 1979 to 1990, responsible for the training of master class students. In 1985 he was appointed full professor. Förster has been a member of the PEN Center Germany since 1991 . In the same year he resigned from the Academy of the Arts because he did not come to terms with the GDR past. He was also recognized as a victim of Stalinism . In 1992 the Wieland Förster Archive was set up at the Berlin Academy of the Arts. In 1996 he was a founding member of the Saxon Academy of the Arts in Dresden.

In 2001 he signed a contract with the Wieland-Förster-Foundation at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden with the donation of 58 sculptures.

Private

Förster lives with his wife in Wensickendorf near Oranienburg.

Create

Wieland Förster created lithographic works from 1960 , etchings and first sculptures for public spaces from 1962 . In the following years Förster undertook a number of working trips abroad, of which a stay in Tunisia in 1967 had a great influence on Förster's work as a visual artist. In the years 1968 to 1973 government agencies in the GDR imposed exhibition bans on forester for ideological reasons and hindered the artist's work. In 1974, thanks to the support of Konrad Wolf, he became a member of the East Berlin German Academy of the Arts and was able to organize his first major exhibition in Potsdam in the old observatory building on Telegraphenberg (organized by Rudolf Tschäpe ) .

Wieland Förster is active as a visual artist in the fields of sculpture , drawing , graphics and painting . In addition, he has published a number of literary works since the 1970s, some of which reflect his own artistic work.

GDR time

Unless otherwise noted, all of Förster's works described are bronzes . Further pictures of the treated works can be found in the Sculptures section .

From the beginning of the 1960s onwards, he created over 80 portraits and portraits of people who were close or admired to him, especially artists. In these works, Wieland Förster fully engaged with what was being represented, tried to penetrate into their essence with varying forms, and so on. a. "Head of the Paralyzed" (1964/65), " Walter Felsenstein " (1963/64), " Zoltán Kodály " (1964), " Otmar Suitner " (1965), " Franz Fühmann " (1969), " Bernhard Minetti " ( 1991/92), " Hartmut Haenchen " (1997), " Elfriede Jelinek " (2000).

Head of the Paralyzed - Usedom Niemeyer-Holstein Museum

In “Head of the Paralyzed” (1964/65) Förster discovered what he considered to be the purest sculptural form: the egg , which forms the core of all sculptures made up of volumes and which is a turn away from the outline-based working method. This decision determines his entire sculptural work and withdraws his sculptures from their genre-like and literary image. At the same time, the egg shape is synonymous with vital being in nature. In 1968 he created the “ Erich Arendt Stele” (1968), a “democratic” memorial form, which is reflected in the steles of “ Pablo Neruda ” (1974), “ Hans Purrmann ” (1980/81), “ Heinrich Böll ” (1988 ) u. a. was continued.

At the time of self-discovery, around 1966, Förster succeeded with the “Little Martyrdom”, the abolition of the addition of individual figures by bundling them into a total, non-narrative sculptural form, which at the same time made the torso the main feature of his art as the goal of condensing the content. His endeavor was to make the torso as a whole tangible (“Passion”, 1966; “Hero”, 1966). This work marks the beginning of his lifelong confrontation with the crimes he suffered in his childhood and youth.

This path taken by Förster stood in direct contrast to the cultural policy of the GDR . After the first exhibition in Greifswald in 1968 , Förster was banned from exhibiting, purchasing and publishing until 1973, in connection with work disabilities. On August 21, 1968, he was deeply shocked by the news that the Warsaw Pact troops had marched into Prague , to which he responded on the same day with a draft memorial for the "shot man" in honor of the resistance.

After a short but intensive journey through Tunisia in 1967, the "olive structure" (after the strong impression of ancient olive trees ) and the sandstone torso "Seldja" (both 1967) were created. While he was drawing for hours, devoted to the primeval nature of the Seldja canyon, processes were taking place in his thinking that erased all encrusted dogmas of civilization.

In 1976/77 Förster turned to larger freelance works in sandstone , such as the " Hommage à Kleist " a torso, stretched between aspiration and injured earthly bondage, which was placed outside the choir of the Marienkirche in Kleist's birthplace Frankfurt (Oder) .

Fettered - Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin

Since Förster's depictions of the Passion were never commissioned, they cannot be tied to external living conditions. Between 1975 and 1979, in a time of greater freedom, two prisoners looking for support grew out of a large piece of sandstone: the “bound”.

In 1971 the "Great Bathers" protruding almost parallel to the earth from the heavy female pool and from 1971 to 1974 the formally consistent " Great Neeberger Figure ", which is both an erotic symbol and a warning of death, was the face behind a cloud of clouds hides and defies any approach.

Both figures are unique in his work in terms of their physical integrity (only the “Great Striding Man” from 1969 can be placed alongside them) and their consistent sculptural form. It can be interpreted as evidence of his artistic maturity, which allowed him to freely interact with the figure.

The larger-than-life “Great Martyrdom” (1977 to 1979) follows, in terms of its plastic intention, its predecessor, the “Little Martyrdom” of 1966, which stands against the official monuments that are additively arranged in groups.

Great grieving man - Dresden, Georg-Treu-Platz

At the beginning of the 1980s, Förster apparently felt in a position to create a memorial for the victims of the air raids on Dresden on February 13, 1945, which weighed up precisely between guilt and retaliation. He worked the larger-than-life figure of a crouching man who had been bombed back to a tiny island and pressed his head and extremities as close to his body as possible in order to survive the inferno of hail of bombs and firestorms. ("Great Mourning Man - Dedicated to the Victims of February 13, 1945 in Dresden", 1979 to 1983). This figure was also created in the inner order, beginning with an unsuitable sandstone, repeated in plaster for bronze. The responsible representatives of the city of Dresden and the party rejected the work, as mourning alone did not seem worth depicting, and massive intervention by the Academy of Arts in Berlin was necessary to force a public display between the Frauenkirche and Brühlscher Terrasse .

Tired of life drawing, Förster approached the detail from 1971 and created a new view of drawing and sculpture with “Insights”: landscapes of the body with caves, ravines, bulges and breakthroughs. ("Insight V", 1978, sandstone; "Great Insight I", 1988). The sandstone torso "Resting" (1978 to 1986) looks large despite its low height of 77 cm. Created in troubled times, it exudes calm and serenity. It is no coincidence that the 1980s ended with the almost life-size, rarely precisely composed sculpture of the "Beaten" from 1989, which was erected in the city in 2003 as a memorial in honor of the Sinti and Roma murdered in Leipzig .

After the turn

According to his own statement, the turning point saved the artist's life and work. After overcoming a serious illness and losing his work space, his mostly large-format late work was created.

In 1993 Förster was given the opportunity to erect a memorial for the victims of Stalinism for the northeast courtyard of the Technical University's memorial and memorial site on Münchner Platz in Dresden , which he made a memorial for all those unjustly persecuted after 1945 . The sculpture stands under the former special investigation cells of the prison of the Soviet military administration after 1945, in which Förster was imprisoned as a 16-year-old. He wiped all personal suffering aside and followed the fateful life of the Soviet poet Anna Akhmatova , whose line of poetry: “Nameless - without a face”, together with the dedication “The wrongly persecuted after 1945”, was the title. The only slightly twisted figure follows the small sculpture " Ecce Homo " made in 1980 .

The victim - Potsdam, courtyard of the memorial and memorial

In 1994 Förster summarized the passions and martyrdoms he had created over the decades in the slightly larger than life sculpture “The Sacrifice” . Similar to the monument “nameless - without a face”, this “victim” has a face. Above the tense neck, the head stretches towards the sky, unite in the form of signs of violence suffered (the body torn by an MP volley) and a crucifixion . The figure conveys the spiritual message that the victim will triumph over violence. It has stood in the courtyard of the memorial of the former Stasi prison in Potsdam since 1995 .

Große Daphne I - Dresden, Wieland Förster Foundation

In his "Great Daphne I" from 1996 his striving to combine nature and abstraction was fulfilled: controlled vitality, wisdom of form, growth and survival according to his own law. At the same time, it is the fulfillment of his endeavors for the torso as a whole. The most sensitive points of every torsion are necessarily the stumps or the cut surfaces of arms and legs, which this Daphne logically close off with the high breasts, similar to an Ionic capital .

In 1998, Förster reacted to the freedom of the time before the fall of the century with the 2.80 m tall "Nike '89". Contrary to the usual portrayal of Nike , the goddess of victory , she portrayed Förster injured, with burned wings, because, according to Förster, there are “no victories without sacrifices”. Rising from fire and storm, it has stood in the gold-plated version on a high shaft at the political focal point of the Glienicke Bridge in Potsdam since 1999, the tenth anniversary of the fall of the Wall . The slightly altered bronze cast of the figure in front of the Saxon state parliament in Dresden has a dedication with the inscription "For freedom and democracy".

In 1999, Förster, in his 2.11 m high figure “Marsyas - Balance of the Century”, settled the 20th century, which for him was a result of wars, persecution and genocide worldwide . The mythological figure of the Greek god Apollo hung on his feet, battered and skinned Silenus was the appropriate symbol for him. The work that stands in front of the museum in Bautzen today had the same artistic significance for the artist as the "Great Daphne I". With these two works there are two figures at the end of his life as a sculptor who express his life theme, the design of love and death.

Förster, constantly sketching, increasingly created graphic works in the early years , the sale of which he was able to live from in times of need. In drawing he preferred sequences or cycles, almost all drawn in pencil or charcoal. His drawings are not study sheets in preparation for the sculptures, but autonomous pictorial drawings, mostly landscapes or bodies that have become landscapes.

In 2007 Förster finished his work as a visual artist and gave up his studio.

Private

Förster lives with his wife in Wensickendorf near Oranienburg .

Awards and honors

Wieland Förster received the following awards for his artistic work:

Works

Sculptures, monuments (selection)

Two women in front of a student residence in Dresden
Nike '89
Nike89-WFörster.jpg
in Dresden
Nike89 Glienicker Bridge (crop) .jpg
in Potsdam

Numerous works by Förster can be found in the public space of Dresden today, B. the bronze sculpture Großer Mrauernder Mann from 1985, which commemorates the victims of the air raids on Dresden in February 1945. This sculpture is back on Georg-Treu-Platz in Dresden. Also in Dresden on the east side of St. Petersburger Strasse in front of the student dormitories is the group sculpture Student Youth or Two Women from 1963.

Significant works that can be found in public spaces today are included in the following list:

Book publications by Wieland Förster (selection)

  • Rügen landscape. Union-Verlag, Berlin 1974.
  • Encounters. Diary, gouaches and drawings from a trip to Tunisia (with an afterword by Franz Fühmann). Volk und Welt publishing house, Berlin 1974.
  • The sealed door. Union-Verlag, Berlin 1982.
  • Insights. Union-Verlag, Berlin 1985.
  • Seven days in Kuks. Union-Verlag, Berlin 1985.
  • Labyrinth. Volk und Welt publishing house, Berlin 1988.
  • Border crossings. Verlag Volk und Welt, Berlin 1995.
  • The unequal. Drei-Masken-Verlag, Munich 1996.
  • "... all my tenderness" (compiled from the correspondence between George Sand and Gustave Flaubert). Drei-Masken-Verlag, Munich 1996.
  • The imagination is the reality. Hinstorff-Verlag, Rostock 2000.
  • As a stranger. Verlag der Nessing'schen Buchdruckerei, Berlin-Adlershof 2003 (= Nessing'sche Hefte No. 2).
  • Inquired in the studio. German Art Publishing House, Berlin 2005.
  • The other. Letters to Alena. Lukas Verlag, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-86732-066-5 .
  • Lily pond. Autobiography of a youth in Dresden 1930–1946. Sandstein, Dresden 2012, ISBN 978-3-942422-89-5 .
  • Tamaschito. Novel of a captivity. Sandstein, Dresden 2017, ISBN 978-3-95498-319-3 .

In addition, Wieland Förster wrote numerous articles in various anthologies .

Book illustrations

reception

Bibliography (selection)

Catalogs

  • Wieland Förster. Schwerin 1967.
  • Wieland Förster. Plastic, drawings, prints. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, and Akademie der Künste Berlin, Berlin 1980.
  • Wieland Förster. Experiences, encounters, experiences. Karl-Marx-Stadt 1987.
  • Wieland Förster. Sculpture and drawings. Weimar 1988.
  • Wieland Förster. Nature studies and factory sketches in small format. Berlin 1990.
  • Wieland Förster. Sculpture, drawings, etchings. Vienna (BAWAG), Stade (museum) and Lindau (museum), 1990 and 1991.
  • Wieland Förster. Love and death. Werklinien, Magdeburg (Monastery of Our Dear Women), Mosigkau (Orangery), 1995.
  • Wieland Förster. Plastic and graphics. Niebüll 1996.
  • Wieland Förster. Plastic, drawing. Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Skulpturensammlung (Albertinum), 1998. Halle (Staatliche Galerie Moritzburg), 1999. Aurich (Kunstpavillon am Ellernfeld), 1999.
  • Wieland Förster. Portrait sculptures. Marbach (Alexanderkirche), Wittlich (Georg-Meistermann-Museum), Frankfurt (Oder) (Marienkirche), 2000.
  • Wieland Förster. Wieland Förster in Dresden. (Foundation catalog) Dresden 2009/2010.
  • Figure hurts. Positions around Wieland Förster's Large Neeberger Figure, Gerhard-Marcks-Haus Bremen 2015. ISBN 978-3-924412-82-1 .
  • Wieland Förster. Century balance. Bautzner Strasse Memorial Dresden 2015. ISBN 978-3-9816421-2-4 .

Monographs etc.

  • Claude Keisch: Wieland Förster. Sculpture and drawing. Verlag der Kunst, Dresden 1977
  • Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster. Catalog raisonné of the sculptures and sculptures. Edited by Johann Konrad Eberlein, LIT Verlag, Vienna 2012, ISBN 978-3-643-50402-9
  • Eva Förster (Ed.): Wieland Förster “... because growth arises from doubt”. From the diaries from 1958 to 1974 (= Akademie der Künste / Archiv-Blätter, 24). Akademie der Künste, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-88331-227-9 .

Films about Wieland Förster (selection)

  • Wieland Förster. December 1979. 1980, documentary by Eduard Schreiber, DEFA-Studio for documentary films
  • Wieland Förster. Record of an imprisonment. 1991, documentary by Peter Voigt, DEFA-Studio for documentary films
  • Wieland Förster. A silent rebel. 1992, documentary by Michael Trabitzsch, Prounen Filmproduktion
  • Give us today our daily bread. 4th part of the television series: The seven petitions of the Lord's Prayer. 1992, for MDR and ORB, WF scenario, directed by Eduard Schreiber, TELLUX-Dresden
  • In the labyrinth - the world of the sculptor Wieland Förster. 2005, documentary by Eduard Schreiber, Radonitz film
  • In conversation - the sculptor Wieland Förster and the poet Uwe Johnson. 2008, documentary by Hanna Lehmbäcker, SMIDAK Filmproduktion Berlin
  • Wieland Förster - "I live to remember". 2015, film by Hanna Lehmbäcker and Konrad Hirsch. Production by Hirsch Film Dresden & Schamoni Film & Medien GmbH, 2015. Saxon Academy of Arts, Saxon State Institute for private broadcasting and new media.

Personal exhibitions (selection)

  • 1967: State Museum Schwerin
  • 1974: Central Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam
  • 1980: State Museums in Berlin (Altes Museum)
  • 1982: Kunsthalle Södertälje (Sweden)
  • 1985: Center culturel de la RDA Paris
  • 1986: XIII. Venice Biennale (with Sabina Grzimek)
  • 1990: BAWAG Fondation Vienna
  • 1991: Swedish Storage Museum Stade. City Museum Lindau
  • 1995: Art Museum Our Dear Women Magdeburg
  • 1998: State Art Collections. Albertinum Dresden
  • 2000: Alexanderkirche Marbach, Georg-Meistermann-Museum Wittlich, Marienkirche Frankfurt (Oder)
  • 2009/10: Dresdner Zwinger, Dresden State Art Collections
  • 2014: Opening of the Wieland Förster room in Oranienburg
  • 2015: figure hurts. Positions around Wieland Förster's Large Neeberger Figure. Gerhard Marcks House, Bremen
  • 2015: Wieland Förster. Century balance. Bautzner Strasse memorial in Dresden
  • 2020: Wieland Förster. Sculptures and drawings. For the sculptor's 90th birthday. Angermuseum Erfurt
  • 2020: Wieland Förster. Describe life. Exhibition for the 90th birthday. Kunstmuseum Kloster Unser Lieben Frauen Magdeburg
  • 2020: Wieland Förster - sculptures from 50 years. For the sculptor's 90th birthday. Kunsthaus Dahlem Berlin

Web links

Commons : Wieland Förster  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Article on the 90th birthday. Der Tagesspiegel, February 12, 2020, accessed on May 4, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Joerg Morre (processing): Book of the Dead, special camps Bautzen . Saxon Memorials Foundation, Dresden 2004, ISBN 3-934382-08-8 .
  3. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 9-10.
  4. ^ Claude Keisch: Wieland Förster: Sculpture and Drawing , Verlag der Kunst, Dresden 1977, pp. 11-15.
  5. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , p. 14.
  6. ^ Deutsche Schillergesellschaft (publisher): Wieland Förster, Portraitplastiken , Marbach 2000, ISBN 3-933679-35-4 , pp. 11–38.
  7. ^ Claude Keisch: Wieland Förster: Sculpture and Drawing , Verlag der Kunst, Dresden 1977, pp. 39–44.
  8. ^ National Museums in Berlin and Academy of Arts of the GDR (editor): Catalog Wieland Förster , Berlin 1980, pp. 51–52.
  9. ^ Magdeburg museums (editor): Love and Death: Werklinien , Magdeburg 1995, ISBN 3-930030-13-6 , p. 50.
  10. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 65–66.
  11. ↑ Catalog: Wieland Förster: Sculpture, Drawings, Etchings . Europaverlag Wien-Zürich, Vienna 1990, ISBN 3-203-51109-6 , p. 20.
  12. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 34–36.
  13. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 51–52.
  14. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , p. 53.
  15. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 44–45.
  16. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 53–54.
  17. ↑ Catalog: Wieland Förster, plastic drawing . Publisher Ernst-Rietschel-Kulturring e. V., Dresden 1998, ISBN 3-00-003129-4 , pp. 75-88.
  18. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , p. 71.
  19. ↑ Monika Mlekusch: Wieland Förster , pp. 69–70.
  20. ↑ Sächsische Zeitung of February 12, 2020, p. 7
  21. ^ Art in public space . Information brochure of the state capital Dresden, December 1996.
  22. ↑ Karin Sandow: Förster's Great Bathers is gone. In: moz.de . February 2, 2013, accessed February 8, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Forester, Wieland
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sculptor
DATE OF BIRTH February 12, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Dresden