William Wauer

Wauer portrait photo, 1919

William Ernst Hermann Wauer (born October 26, 1866 in Oberwiesenthal ; † March 10, 1962 in West Berlin ) was a German sculptor , painter , educator and film director .

Life

education

The son of the Evangelical Lutheran deacon Johann Carl Ernst Wauer and his wife Wilhelmine, née Knobloch, studied after attending grammar schools in Dresden and Halle from 1884 to 1887 at the art academies in Dresden and Berlin , then in Munich . He continued his education for two years in San Francisco and New York , after which he studied philosophy and art history at the University of Leipzig for another semester .

Professional background

Cover by Quickborn , No. 4 (1899), illustrated by Edvard Munch

From 1888 Wauer worked as an art critic for the magazine XX. Century and as a feature editor of a daily newspaper. From 1896 to 1897 Wauer lived in Rome , around 1900 he published the monthly magazine Quickborn . At times he worked for the advertising departments of the companies Lingnerwerke (Dresden), Kupferberg , Kathreiner , Exterikultur and Stollwerck , and he also developed advertising for the dental care product Odol .

Together with Theodor Fritsch he founded the Dresdner Tagesanzeiger and was the publisher of the art magazine Dresdner Gesellschaft . Wauer also wrote theater reviews there. In 1905 he graduated from the directing class of the drama school of the German Theater and then became a theater director at the Deutsches Theater under Max Reinhardt , at the Hebbel Theater and finally director at the Kleiner Theater Unter den Linden . In 1911 he staged Herwarth Walden's pantomime The Four Dead of Fiametta here with great success . He also worked as an editor of several art magazines, such as Der Sturm , whose group of artists he joined in 1912, The Schaubühne and the Society for Stage Art .

From 1913 on, Wauer made some movies. He began with a biography of Richard Wagner with Giuseppe Becce in the title role. In 1915 he realized Bernhard Kellermann's science fiction novel Der Tunnel . On February 1, 1916, he founded his own film company, W. W.-Film Wauer & Co., with which he made six feature films. In January 1917, Wauer took over the technical management of the Flora-Film-Gesellschaft in Charlottenstrasse in Berlin-Mitte , in August of the same year he was appointed managing director of the newly founded company Kultur-Film GmbH. From 1916 to 1920 he was a board member of the Berliner Filmclub e. V . In 1920 Wauer lived at Paulsborner Strasse 91 in Berlin-Wilmersdorf .

Memorial stone in front of Wauer's birthplace in Bahnhofstrasse next to the rectory , Oberwiesenthal

In 1918 he participated for the first time with his own sculptures in the 61st exhibition of the gallery Der Sturm and in the summer of 1922 in the 65th exhibition. He made a name for himself as a portraitist, including through cubist busts of Herwarth Walden (1917), his wife Nell (1918) and Albert Bassermann (1918), later by Friedrich Ebert and Paul von Hindenburg (both 1926).

On October 14, 1920, Wauer performed a new version of the pantomime Die Vier Toten von Fiametta in Dresden's Albert Theater with his stage sets using his sculptures. In the 20's had Wauer for the Bauhaus by Walter Gropius . In 1922 the third Bauhaus portfolio appeared with his lithograph Composition with oval shapes . In 1924 he founded the International Association of Expressionists, Cubists, Futurists and Constructivists (later renamed The Abstracts ) and was its chairman until it was banned in 1933. From 1928 to 1933 he worked for the Berliner Rundfunk, where, together with his wife Ursula Scherz, he directed the programs children 's handicrafts and women's lessons for artistic handicrafts .

Wauer's grave at the Dahlem forest cemetery

The seizure of power of the Nazis in 1933 ended the diverse activities Wauer. Despite his attempts to serve himself to the new rulers, his works were counted as degenerate art , and in 1941 the Reich Chamber of Culture issued him a work ban . Only after 1945 was Wauer able to continue his artistic activity and again participated in exhibitions with sculptures, pictures and graphics. He worked as a lecturer at the adult education center in West Berlin and was a member of the board of the Association of Adult Education Lecturers for several years. From 1957 he was chairman of the Association of German Cultural Units, and he also became an honorary member of the Association of Berlin Art and Antique Dealers.

Wauer, married three times, had a son (Hans, * 1904, who later made a name for himself as a writer). William Wauer is buried in the Dahlem Forest Cemetery . His grave is dedicated to the city of Berlin as an honorary grave .

Filmography (as a director)

1913: Richard Wagner (also screenplay and actor) 1913: Bismarck 1914: New Year's Eve party in the trenches (also script) 1914: the winner (also screenplay) 1915: On the Alm 1915: The mysterious wanderer 1915: The Loder 1915: This is how the sun takes revenge 1915: The tunnel 1916: Countess Heyers 1916: Dishonored (also screenplay and production) 1916: Conscious of guilt (also script) 1916: Rosa can do anything 1916: Peter Lump (also screenplay and production) 1917: The procurator's daughter (also screenplay)

1917: Am Abgrund (also screenplay and production) 1918: Lorenzo Burghardt 1918: people who wander through life 1918: Dr. Bulkheads 1918: The von Zaarden brothers 1918: father and son 1918: women swallowed up by the abyss 1919: The Ghosts of Garden Hall 1919: Starving millionaires 1919: The hangman's daughter 1919: Carewicz 1920: masks 1921: The nights of Cornelis Brouwer 1921: Beauty of Life (Uroda zycia)

Publications

• An alley for art! Critical contributions to theater reforms . Berlin [?] 1891; 2nd edition: Seemann, Berlin 1906.
• Age . Ed. And dedicated to the youth from ... to April 1st. G. Wauer, Berlin 1898.
• The art in the theater. Remarks and thoughts . Priber & Lamuers, Berlin 1909.
• The artistic foundations of film . In: Erste Internationale Film-Zeitung , No. 21, 1915, pp. 5–12.
• The argument about the Faust film . In: Der Film , No. 37, 1916, p. 32.
• Theater as a work of art. The storm book . Sturm-Verlag, Berlin 1919.
• Knowledge of expressionism . Guide to the abstract exhibition. Berlin 1926.
• Handicraft booklets. The red booklet (for children aged 6 to 10). Safari, Berlin 1931.
• Handicraft booklets. The green notebook . (For children from 10 to 14 years). Safari, Berlin 1931.
• (with Ursula Scherz): Notebooks for handicrafts. The yellow booklet (for young people and adults). Safari, Berlin 1931.

Sculptures and pictures (selection)

1916: The Skater , polished bronze 1917: Herwarth Walden 1918: Universe , tempera picture 1918: Nell Walden , bronze and replicas after 1945 1918: Rudolf Blümner , bronze 1918/1919: Two bodies , ink drawing 1919 Portrait head Rudolf Blümner , bronze (cast by W. Füssel in Berlin) The adulteress (no year), India ink drawing Icebear Discus thrower 24 bronze sculptures at auction at Christies auction house, 8 of them in photos Rapture (seated) (no year), bronze, at least 7 casts The Shepherd , bronze, at least seven casts The lightning rider , silver-plated bronze

1920: Geometric composition , oil on hardboard 1920s: dog and cat , bronze Composition with oval shapes , lithography 1921: Der Sturz , bronze, (cast by W. Füssel in Berlin with work number) 1922: portrait study Lu ; Oil painting 1923: The Dancer , bronze, 7 casts (cast by W. Füssel, Berlin) 1923: Portrait of Professor Wilhelm Paulsen , oil on canvas 1924: Masked ball fools procession (a motley oil painting) before 1928: the skater 1928: Boxer I (southpaw) ; Boxer II (left boom) , bronzes, at least seven casts (cast by W. Füssel, Berlin) 1928: Standing , bronze and plaster 1930: head , oil on canvas on cardboard 1947: Portrait of Karl Hofer , oil on panel

Exhibitions and appreciation

• 1927, 1928 and 1929 sculptures by Wauer were shown at the Great Berlin Art Exhibition and received awards
• In 1980 the exhibition William Wauer took place in the sculpture museum Glaskasten Marl . Sculptures and paintings take place.
• In 1991 the gallery on the market in Annaberg-Buchholz showed the Wilhelm Wauer (1866-1962) exhibition . Painting and sculpture
• Since 2014, various works, especially paintings and sculptures , have been shown in the permanent exhibition of the Wiesenthaler K3 , the museum of the city of Kurort Oberwiesenthal. In particular, the curators have worked out his artistic versatility. Wauer also broke new pedagogical territory, because he was working with disabled children for the first time.
• 2011: William Wauer and Berlin Cubism , Georg-Kolbe-Museum, Berlin, then Edwin-Scharff-Museum , Neu-Ulm
• In Oberwiesenthal , Wauer's birthplace, an alley next to the city museum was named William-Wauer-Weg after 1990 .
• 2019: Solo exhibition with bronze sculptures, paintings, drawings and graphics by the expressionist-cubist artist William Wauer in a private art gallery in Berlin

The city administration had an artistically designed monument erected in front of his birthplace on Bahnhofstrasse. This does not show the person Wauer, but names his fields of activity and life data.

literature

• Wilhelm Wauer and Berlin Cubism . Wienand Verlag, Cologne 2011, ISBN 978-3-86832-056-5

Web links

Commons : William Wauer  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• William Wauer in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Biography with photo
• Biography at CineGraph - Lexicon for German-language film
• Animated film Wilhelm Wauer on www.youtube.com.
• Cubism , W. Wauer in the Kolbe Museum

Individual evidence

1. ^ William Wauer on the website of the Kettererkunst auction house , accessed on March 14, 2019.
2. ^ Flora-Film GmbH . In: Berliner Adreßbuch , 1917, Part I, p. 658.
3. ↑ Wauer, William; Director . In: Berliner Adreßbuch , 1920, part 1, p. 2999.
4. ^ Special exhibition William Wauer ( Memento from February 6, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 196 kB), edwinscharffmuseum.de, accessed on August 9, 2013.
5. ↑ In a memorandum sent to Minister of Education Bernhard Rust on July 24, 1933 , Wauer tried to incorporate Expressionism into the National Socialist line of tradition: “I consider our Führer to be the exponent of Expressionism, his ingenuity is expressionistic by nature, just like in the same way Mussolini is a futurist . ” “ The bridge ”as statecraft of the Third Reich? , In: NZZ , July 19, 2003.
6. ↑ Hans Wauer on ZVAB.de, accessed on May 2, 2020.
7. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o} Brief description and photos of some works by W. Wauer at www.kettererkunst.de, accessed on March 14, 2019.
8. ↑ Bronze bust Walden on www.lotsearch.de; accessed on March 14, 2019.
9. ↑ Works by W. Wauer on www.kunstmarkt.com , accessed on March 14, 2019.
10. ↑ ^{a b} exhibit in the Wauer Museum, Oberwiesenthal, seen in 2017.
11. ↑ Wauer on www.lotsearch.de; accessed on March 14, 2019.
12. ↑ Figure and brief description of ecstasy (seated) on lempertz.com, accessed on March 14, 2019.
13. ↑ Figure and brief information The Shepherd , two versions on lempertz.com, accessed on March 14, 2019.
14. ↑ The Blitzreiter illustration and brief information at www.lempertz.com, accessed on March 14, 2019.
15. ↑ ^{a b c} William Wauer at www.galerie-weick.de , accessed on March 14, 2019.
16. ↑ Boxer at www.lotsearch , accessed March 14, 2019.
17. ↑ Figure and brief description of standing at www.kunstmarkt.com; accessed on March 14, 2019.
18. ↑ Figure and brief description of the head on www.kunstmarkt.com; accessed on March 14, 2019.
19. ↑ Illustration and brief information on the portrait of Karl Hofe at www.lempertz.com, accessed on March 14, 2019.
20. ↑ Permanent exhibition in Wiesenthaler K3. In: www.oberwiesenthal.de. Retrieved January 6, 2017 . 
21. ↑ 16 Wauer. In: www.annaberger.info. Retrieved January 6, 2017 . 
22. ^ Exhibition with works by W. Wauer in the Galerie Brockstedt, Berlin , accessed on March 14, 2019.