Lothar Wolleh (January 20, 1930 – September 28, 1979) was a well-known German photographer.
Until the end of the sixties, Lothar Wolleh worked as a commercial photographer. He took portraits of international contemporary painters, sculptors and
performance artPerformance art is art in which the actions of an individual or a group at a particular place and in a particular time constitute the work. It can happen anywhere, at any time, or for any length of time. Performance art can be any situation that involves four basic elements: time, space, the...
ists. Altogether, he photographed about 109 artists, including known personalities such as
Georg BaselitzGeorg Baselitz is a German painter who studied in the former East Germany, before moving to what was then the country of West Germany...
,
Joseph BeuysJoseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art....
,
Dieter RothDieter Roth was a Swiss-German artist best known for his artist's books and for his sculptures and pictures made with rotting food stuffs...
,
Jean TinguelyJean Tinguely was a Swiss painter and sculptor. He is best known for his sculptural machines or kinetic art, in the Dada tradition; known officially as metamechanics...
,
René MagritteRené François Ghislain Magritte
[p] was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images...
,
Günther UeckerGünther Uecker, also known as Guenther Uecker, is a German sculptor, op artist and installation artist. He was born in West Germany in 1930. Uecker began his artistic education in 1949 when he took up studies at Wismar. He then went to the art school in Berlin-Weißensee and in 1955 to the...
,
Gerhard Richter- Biography :Richter was born in Dresden, Saxony, and grew up in Reichenau, Lower Silesia, and in Waltersdorf in the Upper Lusatian countryside. He left school after tenth grade and apprenticed as an advertising and stage-set painter, before studying at the Dresden Art Academy...
and
ChristoChristo and Jeanne-Claude are a married couple who create environmental works of art...
.
Lothar Wolleh spent his youth in a Germany stamped by war and
NazismNazism, known officially in German as National Socialism , is the totalitarian ideology and practices of the Nazi Party or National Socialist German Workers’ Party under Adolf Hitler, and the policies adopted by the dictatorial government of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945.Nazism is often considered...
.
In the years from 1946 to 1948 he studied concrete painting in the
elementary schoolAn elementary school is an institution where children receive the first stage of compulsory education known as elementary or primary education. Elementary school is the preferred term in some countries, particularly those in North America...
class at the
Hochschule für angewandte Kunst in
Berlin-WeißenseeWeissensee is a locality in the borough of Pankow in Berlin, Germany, named for the small lake Weißer See within it. Before Berlin's 2001 administrative reform, Weissensee was a borough in its own right, consisting of the localities of Weissensee, Heinersdorf, Blankenburg, Karow and...
.
As a young man, he was arrested on the suspicion of spying by the Russian occupying forces, and was condemned to fifteen years forced labour and underground mining in Siberia.
Lothar Wolleh (January 20, 1930 – September 28, 1979) was a well-known German photographer.
Until the end of the sixties, Lothar Wolleh worked as a commercial photographer. He took portraits of international contemporary painters, sculptors and
performance artPerformance art is art in which the actions of an individual or a group at a particular place and in a particular time constitute the work. It can happen anywhere, at any time, or for any length of time. Performance art can be any situation that involves four basic elements: time, space, the...
ists. Altogether, he photographed about 109 artists, including known personalities such as
Georg BaselitzGeorg Baselitz is a German painter who studied in the former East Germany, before moving to what was then the country of West Germany...
,
Joseph BeuysJoseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art....
,
Dieter RothDieter Roth was a Swiss-German artist best known for his artist's books and for his sculptures and pictures made with rotting food stuffs...
,
Jean TinguelyJean Tinguely was a Swiss painter and sculptor. He is best known for his sculptural machines or kinetic art, in the Dada tradition; known officially as metamechanics...
,
René MagritteRené François Ghislain Magritte
[p] was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images...
,
Günther UeckerGünther Uecker, also known as Guenther Uecker, is a German sculptor, op artist and installation artist. He was born in West Germany in 1930. Uecker began his artistic education in 1949 when he took up studies at Wismar. He then went to the art school in Berlin-Weißensee and in 1955 to the...
,
Gerhard Richter- Biography :Richter was born in Dresden, Saxony, and grew up in Reichenau, Lower Silesia, and in Waltersdorf in the Upper Lusatian countryside. He left school after tenth grade and apprenticed as an advertising and stage-set painter, before studying at the Dresden Art Academy...
and
ChristoChristo and Jeanne-Claude are a married couple who create environmental works of art...
.
Life
Lothar Wolleh spent his youth in a Germany stamped by war and
NazismNazism, known officially in German as National Socialism , is the totalitarian ideology and practices of the Nazi Party or National Socialist German Workers’ Party under Adolf Hitler, and the policies adopted by the dictatorial government of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945.Nazism is often considered...
.
In the years from 1946 to 1948 he studied concrete painting in the
elementary schoolAn elementary school is an institution where children receive the first stage of compulsory education known as elementary or primary education. Elementary school is the preferred term in some countries, particularly those in North America...
class at the
Hochschule für angewandte Kunst in
Berlin-WeißenseeWeissensee is a locality in the borough of Pankow in Berlin, Germany, named for the small lake Weißer See within it. Before Berlin's 2001 administrative reform, Weissensee was a borough in its own right, consisting of the localities of Weissensee, Heinersdorf, Blankenburg, Karow and...
.
As a young man, he was arrested on the suspicion of spying by the Russian occupying forces, and was condemned to fifteen years forced labour and underground mining in Siberia. After serving six years at the Russian punishment camp
VorkutaVorkuta is a coal mining town in the Komi Republic, Russia, situated just north of the Arctic circle in the Pechora coal basin at the Usa river. , its population was 84,917. It had its origin in one of the more notorious forced labour camps of the Gulag which was established in 1932...
, he was able to return to Berlin due to successful negotiations concerning German prisoners of war.
After returning from prison, from 1956 to 1957 he obtained an education in the Lette-Verein, a continuation school for photography, design and fashion in Berlin.
He took part in a monthly repeated recovery program of the
World Council of ChurchesThe World Council of Churches is an international Christian ecumenical organization. Based in Geneva, Switzerland , it is a fellowship of about 340 churches of which 157 are members...
for the war-disabled youth. This made it possible for him to visit the Swedish island of
Gotland' is a county, province, municipality and diocese of Sweden and the largest island in the Baltic Sea. At 3,140 square kilometers in area, it makes up less than one percent of Sweden's total land area. The region also includes the small islands of Fårö and Gotska Sandön to the north, and the tiny...
in 1958, which was a motivation for his lifelong strong affinity towards the Swedish culture, landscape and people.
From 1959 to 1961, he studied at the Folkwangschule für Gestaltung in
EssenEssen is a city in the central part of the Ruhr Area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Located on the Ruhr River, its population of approximately 579,000 makes it either the 7th- or 8th-largest-city in Germany...
. One of Wolleh's teachers was the German photographer
Otto SteinertOtto Steinert was an important German photographer.Born in Saarbrücken, Germany, Steinert was a medical doctor by profession and was an autodidact in photography. After World War II, he initially worked for the State School for Art and Craft in Saarbrücken...
.
In his first years as a freelance photographer, he was most successful in advertising, recruiting customers such as
Deutsche BundesbahnThe Deutsche Bundesbahn or DB was formed as the state railway of the newly established Federal Republic of Germany on September 7, 1949 as a successor of the Deutsche Reichsbahn-Gesellschaft '...
or
VolkswagenThe Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft , also known as Volkswagen Group or as VW, is an automobile manufacturer and mobility organisation based in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany and is the pioneer brand within the Volkswagen Group, which contains the car brands Audi AG, Bentley Motors Ltd.,...
.
In 1965, he photographed the
Second Vatican CouncilThe Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, or Vatican II, was the twenty-first Ecumenical Council of the Catholic Church. It opened under Pope John XXIII on 11 October, 1962 and closed under Pope Paul VI on 8 December, 1965...
in Rome. After that, he collaborated with Emil Schmitz to make the documentary
Das Konzil. II. Vatikanisches Konzil. In 1975 he photographed the
JubileeThe concept of the Jubilee is a special year of remission of sins and universal pardon. In the Biblical book of Leviticus, a Jubilee year is mentioned to occur every fifty years, in which slaves and prisoners would be freed, debts would be forgiven and the mercies of God would be particularly...
, and published the photographic folios
Das Konzil (1965) and
Apostolorum Limina (1975).
At the request of his friend, the German painter
Günther UeckerGünther Uecker, also known as Guenther Uecker, is a German sculptor, op artist and installation artist. He was born in West Germany in 1930. Uecker began his artistic education in 1949 when he took up studies at Wismar. He then went to the art school in Berlin-Weißensee and in 1955 to the...
, at the end of the 1960s Wolleh began to systematically portray more than one hundred international well known painters, sculptors, and Actionsts. Among those photographed were
Gerhard Richter- Biography :Richter was born in Dresden, Saxony, and grew up in Reichenau, Lower Silesia, and in Waltersdorf in the Upper Lusatian countryside. He left school after tenth grade and apprenticed as an advertising and stage-set painter, before studying at the Dresden Art Academy...
,
Niki de Saint PhalleNiki de Saint Phalle, born Catherine-Marie-Agnès Fal de Saint Phalle was a French sculptor, painter, and film maker.-The early years:...
and
Jean TinguelyJean Tinguely was a Swiss painter and sculptor. He is best known for his sculptural machines or kinetic art, in the Dada tradition; known officially as metamechanics...
.
Out of this project several comprehensive photobook-projects evolved:
- 1970- UdSSR
- 1972- Art Scene Düsseldorf
- 1972- Apostolorum Limina
- 1973- Das Unterwasserbuch (together with Joseph Beuys
Joseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art....
.)
Work
Lothar Wolleh has used a very individual style with strict principles in his photowork with mostly symmetrical compositions. Besides he captured a characteristic square format for his images; on the whole Wolleh made portrait photos of round about 109 artists.
Until 2007 the comprehensive retrospective
Lothar Wolleh – Eine Wiederentdeckung: Fotografien 1959 bis 1979 (Lothar Wolleh - A Rediscovery: Photographs 1959 to 1979) will be shown in Germany at
Kunsthalle BremenThe Kunsthalle Bremen is an art museum in the Hanseatic City Bremen, Germany.The Kunsthalle was built in 1849 and enlarged in 1902 by architect Eduard Gildemeister....
, Stadtmuseum Hofheim, Kunstmuseum Ahlen and the Deutschherrenhaus Koblenz.
List of photographed artists
- Magdalena Abakanowicz
Magdalena Abakanowicz is a Polish sculptor. She is notable for her use of textiles as a sculptural medium and is regarded as being one of the most important and influential female artists of the 20th century. She has been a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań, Poland from 1965 to 1990...
- Armand Pierre Fernandez
- Georg Baselitz
Georg Baselitz is a German painter who studied in the former East Germany, before moving to what was then the country of West Germany...
- Joseph Beuys
Joseph Beuys was a German performance artist, sculptor, installation artist, graphic artist, art theorist and pedagogue of art....
- Max Bill
Max Bill was a Swiss architect, artist, painter, typeface designer, industrial designer and graphic designer.Bill was born in Winterthur...
- Agostino Bonalumi
- Artur Brunsz
- Camille Bryen
- Pol Bury
Pol Bury was a Belgian sculptor who began his artistic career as a painter in the Jeune Peintre Belge and COBRA groups. Among his most famous works is the fountain-sculpture L'Octagon, located in San Francisco....
- Enrico Castellani
Enrico Castellani is Italian artist of the Modern Art era . He studied at the Ecole Nationale Superieure in Belgium, then settled in Milan. He collaborated with artists such as Getulio Alviani, Piero Manzoni, and others....
- Mario Ceroli
- César Pelli
César Pelli is an Argentine architect known for designing some of the world's tallest buildings and other major urban landmarks. His designs are known for their curved facades and metallic elements....
- Christo
- Gianni Colombo
- Sonia Delaunay-Terk
- Gerad Deschamps
- Paul Dierkes
- Cesar Domela
César Domela was a Dutch sculptor, painter, photographer, and typographer, and a key member of the De Stijl movement.-Life:...
- Francois Dufrene
- Ulrich Erben
- Robert Filliou
Robert Filliou was a French Fluxus artist, who produced works as a filmmaker, "action poet," sculptor, and happenings maestro....
- Lucio Fontana
Lucio Fontana was a painter and sculptor born in Rosario, , the son of an Italian father and an Argentine mother...
- Vic Gentils
- Karl Gerstner
- Stefan Gierowski
Stefan Gierowski is a Polish abstractionist painter of great renown.For many years he was a professor of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw and garnered numerous artistic distinctions. He abandoned "matter painting" midway through the 1950s and devoted himself entirely to abstraction and optical...
- Renate Göbel
- Zbigniew Gostomski
- Jerzy Grabowski
- Gotthard Graubner
Gotthard Graubner is an important contemporary German painter. His work Black Skin was selected as one of the 100 Great Paintings program by the BBC in 1980.- Time Line :- Style :...
- Raymond Hains
Raymond Hains was a French artist and photographer.-Biography:In 1945 Hains briefly enrolled in the sculpture course at the École des Beaux-Arts, Rennes and met Jacques de la Villeglé that same year. He then collaborated with E. Sougez as a photographer for France-Illustration...
- Al Hansen
Al Hansen was an American artist considered as one of the most important Fluxus figures. He was a Norwegian American....
- Bernhard Heiliger
- Jan Henderikse
- Geoffrey Hendricks
Geoffrey Hendricks is an American artist associated with Fluxus since the mid 1960s, and is often referred to as "cloudsmith" for his extensive work with sky imagery in paintings, on objects, in installations and performances. Hendricks was born in Littleton, New Hampshire in 1931...
|
Jiri Hillmar
Dorothy Iannone
Margrit Jäggli
Jerzy Kalucki
Allen Kaprow
Edward Kienholz Edward Kienholz was an American installation artist whose work was highly critical of aspects of modern life. He often collaborated with his wife, Nancy Reddin Kienholz, from 1972 until his death. Collectively, they are referred to as "Kienholz".- Early life and artistic development :Edward...
Konrad KlapheckKonrad Klapheck is a German painter and graphic artist whose style of painting combines features of realism, Surrealism and Pop art.He was born in Düsseldorf...
Jiry Kolar
Jan KotikJan Jakub Kotík was a Czech artist and rock drummer.- Life :Jan Jakub was the son of composer Petr Kotík, who emigrated to the USA in 1960. Jan was a musician and visual artist. He played drums with the Mommyheads, Beekeeper, and Church of Betty, among many other bands in New York City...
Edward Krasinski
Ferdinand Kriwet
Frantisek Kyncl
Laszlo Lakner
Berhard Luginbühl
Adolf Luther
Heinz Mack
René MagritteRené François Ghislain Magritte [p] was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images...
Jadwiga Maziarska
Paul MansouroffPaul Andréevitch Mansouroff was an understated painter of the Russian avant-garde movement of the 1920s...
Christian Megert
Henry Moore Henry Spencer Moore OM CH FBA was an English sculptor and artist. He was best known for his abstract monumental bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art....
Claes OldenburgClaes Oldenburg is a sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects. Another theme in his work is soft sculpture versions of everyday objects.-Biography:...
Roman OpalkaRoman Opałka is a Polish painter born in France.In 1965, in his studio in Warsaw, Opalka began painting a process of counting - from one to infinity. Starting in the top left-hand corner of the canvas and finishing in the bottom right-hand corner, the tiny numbers are painted in horizontal rows...
Jerzy Orbitowski
Robin PageRobin Page is a painter. He was one of the early members of the Fluxus art movement.-Biography:Page was born in England in 1932. His father, Peter Carter-Page, was a humorist and cartoonist who worked as an animator at the Disney studios in Hollywood in the 1930’s. The family moved to Canada...
Blinky PalermoBlinky Palermo, born Peter Schwarze, aka Peter Heisterkamp , was a German abstract painter.Schwarze was given his outlandish name in 1964, during his studies with Joseph Beuys at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf...
Lil Picard
Otto PieneOtto Piene is a German artist.-Biography:Otto Piene was born 1928 in Bad Laasphe and was raised in Lübbecke. Between 1949 and 1953 he studied painting and art education at the Academy of Art in Munich and the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. He was lecturer at the Fashion Institute in Düsseldorf...
Mark PrentMark Prent is a native Canadian sculptor and performance artist currently living in the US best known for the graphic realism of his figurative sculpture. Prent's sculptures have been described as disturbing and even brutal...
Man RayMan Ray, born Emmanuel Radnitzky , was an American artist who spent most of his career in Paris, France. Perhaps best described simply as a modernist, he was a significant contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal...
Jean-Pierre Raynaud
Martial RaysseMartial Raysse is a French artist born in Golfe-Juan February 12, 1936. He lives in Issigeac - France.-Biography: Raysse was born in a ceramists family in Vallauris and began to paint and write poetry at age 12. After studying and practising athleticism at a high level, he began to accumulate...
Rrich Reusch
Gerhard Richter- Biography :Richter was born in Dresden, Saxony, and grew up in Reichenau, Lower Silesia, and in Waltersdorf in the Upper Lusatian countryside. He left school after tenth grade and apprenticed as an advertising and stage-set painter, before studying at the Dresden Art Academy...
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Hans Richter
Klaus Rinke
Mimmo Rotella Domenico "Mimmo" Rotella, , was an Italian artist and poet best known for his works of décollage and psychogeographics, made from torn advertising posters.Rotella was born in Catanzaro, Calabria....
Dieter RothDieter Roth was a Swiss-German artist best known for his artist's books and for his sculptures and pictures made with rotting food stuffs...
Ulrich Rückriem
Reiner Ruthenbeck
Niki de Saint PhalleNiki de Saint Phalle, born Catherine-Marie-Agnès Fal de Saint Phalle was a French sculptor, painter, and film maker.-The early years:...
Jan J.Schoonhoven
Kajetan Sosnowski-External links:*...
Jesús Rafael SotoJesús Rafael Soto was a Venezuelan op and kinetic artist, a sculptor and a painter.He was born in Ciudad Bolívar, Venezuela. He began his artistic career as a boy painting cinema posters in his native city...
Daniel SpoerriDaniel Spoerri is a Swiss artist and writer born in Romania, who has been called “the central figure of European post-war art” and “one of the most renown[ed] [artists] of the 20th century.” Spoerri is best known for his “snare-pictures,” a type of assemblage or object art, in which he captures...
Friederich Stabenau
Henryk StażewskiHenryk Stażewski was a Polish painter, considered to be a pioneer of the classical avant-garde of the 1920s and 1930s. He was a foremost representative of the Constructivist movement, as well as the co-creator of the Geometric Abstract art movement....
Jonasz Stern
Rolf Szymanski
Feliks Szyszko
Paul Talman
André ThomkinsAndré Thomkins is a Swiss painter, illustrator, and poet. From 1952, he lived in Germany and taught at the art academy in Düsseldorf between 1971 and 1973....
Jean TinguelyJean Tinguely was a Swiss painter and sculptor. He is best known for his sculptural machines or kinetic art, in the Dada tradition; known officially as metamechanics...
Mark TobeyMark George Tobey was an American abstract expressionist painter, born in Centerville, Wisconsin. Widely recognized throughout the United States and Europe, Tobey is the most noted among the "mystical painters of the Northwest." Senior in age and experience, Tobey had a strong influence on the...
Jerzy Trelinski
Günther UeckerGünther Uecker, also known as Guenther Uecker, is a German sculptor, op artist and installation artist. He was born in West Germany in 1930. Uecker began his artistic education in 1949 when he took up studies at Wismar. He then went to the art school in Berlin-Weißensee and in 1955 to the...
Georges VantongerlooGeorges Vantongerloo was a Belgian abstract sculptor and painter and founding member of the De Stijl group.-Life:...
Jef Verheyen
Jacques VillegleJacques Villeglé, born Jacques Mahé de la Villeglé is a French mixed-media artist and affichiste famous for his alphabet with symbolic letters and decollage with ripped or lacerated posters...
Marian Warzecha
Stefan Wewerka
Ryszard Winiarski
Ray Woolard
Fritz WotrubaFritz Wotruba was an Austrian sculptor of Czecho-Hungarian descent. He was considered one of the most notable Austrian 20th century sculptors...
Herbert Zangs
Rajmund Ziemski |
Publications
- 1965: The Council;: The Second Vatican Council; Chr. Belser Verlag
- 1970: UdSSR. Der Sowjetstaat und seine Menschen.; Chr. Belser Verlag
- 1971: Günther Uecker / Lothar Wolleh: Nagelbuch; Verlag Galerie Der Spiegel, Köln
- 1972: Lothar Wolleh: Art Scene Düsseldorf 1; Chr. Belser Verlag
- 1975: Lothar Wolleh: Apostolorum Limina; Arcade Verlag, Arcade Verlag
- 1978: Günther Uecker: Ludwig van Beethovens Leonore. Idee einer Oper; Belser Verlag
External links