Background
Willi Baumeister was born on January 22, 1889 in Stuttgart, Germany.
Willi Baumeister was born on January 22, 1889 in Stuttgart, Germany.
Initially, Baumeister was trained as a painter and decorator during the period from 1905 to 1907. He continued his studies and in 1909 enrolled at the Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design, where he studied under Adolf Hölzel and befriended Otto Meyer-Amden and Oskar Schlemmer. Willi also attended Robert Poetzelberger’s drawing class and took additional lessons from Josef Kerschensteiner.
Baumeister took his first trip to Paris in 1911, successfully participated in a gallery exhibition in Zurich in 1912 and a year later participated in The First German Autumn Salon in the Berlin gallery Der Sturm, where he met the expressionist painter Franz Marc.
In 1914, the painter held his first solo exhibition at Der Neue Kunstsalon (New Art Salon) in Stuttgart. Two years later, he participated in the exhibition Hölzel und sein Kreis (Hölzel and his Circle) at the Art Association in Freiburg im Breisgau, which was subsequently shown at the Ludwig Schames Art Salon in Frankfurt am Main.
In 1919, Baumeister produced his first stage design, which was followed by seventeen others. The following year, he worked as an independent artist and participated in exhibitions in Berlin, Dresden and Hagen.
During these years, Baumeister developed professional relationships with artists, such as Paul Klee, Léger, Le Corbusier, Amédée Ozenfant and Michel Seuphor. In 1924, several of his works were shown at the Erste Allgemeine Deutsche Kunstausstellung (First General German Art Exhibition) in Moscow and, in 1925, he participated in the Paris exhibition L’Art d’aujourd’hui (Art Today). Alongside his artistic work, he was also active in the area of commercial art and designed advertisements for numerous companies, such as Bosch and DLW (Deutsche Linoleumwerke).
In 1927, Baumeister was appointed a teacher at the Frankfurt School of Applied Arts, later known the Städel. He held the position until March 31, 1933. Thereafter, Baumeister earned his living mainly from commercial art.
In 1937, the painter began working at varnish factory in Wuppertal, the owner of which was Dr. Kurt Herberts. Until 1941, when a ban on his paintings and exhibitions was issued by the National Arts Chamber, Baumeister still had many opportunities to exhibit his works abroad in Europe. Despite the prohibition and the constant surveillance, he still worked at the Herberts varnish factory, as well as on his art.
In 1945, after the end of the Second World War, Willi Baumeister completed his book Das Unbekannte in der Kunst (The Unknown in Art), which was only published in 1947.
In 1946, Baumeister began to teach at the Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design and worked there until his retirement in 1955.
In 1947, the painter resumed his exhibition activities.
Until his death, Willi took part in many national and international exhibitions, such as the Venice Biennale in 1948, the São Paulo Biennale (Brazil) in 1951 and Younger European Artists at the Guggenheim Museum in New York in 1953.
Three Stepped Figures
Amenophis
Bluxao
Harps
Tennis Players
Tori
Flamelet Picture
Runner
Monturi, White Discus
Aztec Couple
Planar Relation
Chess
Painter with Palette
Bluxao V
Wind
Lutins au Printemps
Stone Garden
Happy Day
Hockey
Safer 5
Montaru 9
Primordial Figures
The Sculptor
Seated Figure - Abstracted
Two Epochs
Sun Figures
Dedicated to Jacques Callot
Africa I
Floating Forms with White
The Prophet and Herodias
Gilgamesh and Enkidu
Reddish Tennis
Chess Players III
Variation on Eidos I
Animated Slope
Wall Picture with Metals
Magic Rupestre
Phantom and Yellow Table
Maya Wall
Red Landscape
Abstrakte Komposition
Aru with Yellow
Eidos Floating
Combing with Dots
Colored Ideogram
Seaweed
Figure in Motion
Aru Dark Blue
Esther XX
African Tale
Apollo
Ideogram
Soccer Player
Diver with Reflection III
Figure in Motion
Peruvian Wall
The Painter
Machine Man with Spiral Turn
White Butterfly
Ideogram
Phantom with Red Figure
Aru 2
Picture T 21
Mask 4
Self-Portrait
Depiction of Apollo
Animated Landscape
Planar Tension with Red
Tennis
Black Metamorphosis
Swimmers on the Ladder
Han-i on Yellow
Monturi with Red and Blue
Shamash told us to fight against Chumbaba
Perforation on Yellow
Owambo
Perforation
Nocturno
Female Runner II
Jurassic
Machine with Red Square
Soccer Field
Wall Picture with Segments
Willi was a member of the artist association "Abstraction-Création" in Paris.
Willi Baumeister married the painter Margarete Oehm in 1926.