Fritz Winter
Paths to documenta (1949-1955)

An exhibition to mark the 70th anniversary of documenta and the 120th birthday of Fritz Winter

With the exhibition "Fritz Winter. Paths to documenta (1949-1955)", the Galerie Henze & Ketterer focuses on one of the most influential artistic personalities of German post-war modernism. To mark the 70th anniversary of the first documenta in 1955, the show, curated by Patrick Urwyler, takes a concentrated look at the decisive years that placed Fritz Winter (1905-1976) at the forefront of contemporary art.

In 1955, his painting "Composition before Blue and Yellow" was the central work in the painting hall of the Museum Fridericianum in Kassel - a symbol of the new self-confidence of German post-war abstraction. Presented directly opposite Picasso's "Girl in Front of a Mirror", Winter's large-format work became a symbol of West German painting's successful connection to international art developments.

Two key pioneers of Fritz Winter's success were the poet, intellectual and life partner Dr. Margarete Schreiber-Rüffer (1890-1958) and the Bernese gallery owner Hedwig Marbach. Their work in the years after the war deserves special attention - not least because it has a direct impact on today's exhibition. But more on this later.

Three early works shown at the beginning of the exhibition point the way forward for Winter's artistic path. They represent the phase before the Second World War and are crucial for understanding his works of the 1950s. Looking back, Ingeborg Henze-Ketterer and Wolfgang Henze state: "In a painting from the 1950s, the signs, forms and colors of the early years around 1930 are just as present as those of later years can already be guessed at".

Dr. Margarete Schreiber-Rüffer
- the basis for Winter's career

After 1949, it was Dr. Margarete Schreiber-Rüffer in particular who played a key role in ensuring that Winter's work was not forgotten during his absence - on the contrary: she promoted his fame at home and abroad. During the war and in the years that followed, she organized exhibitions in Stuttgart, Karlsruhe, Hanover, Cologne, Berlin, Munich, Paris and Switzerland. She cultivated contacts with art historians, gallery owners and collectors - including Ottomar Domnick, an important promoter of abstract art in Germany.

Schreiber-Rüffer published the groundbreaking essay "Über Fritz Winter" in the book "Die schöpferischen Kräfte in der abstrakten Malerei" in 1947 - a work which, together with the accompanying exhibition of abstract artists (including Winter), contributed significantly to the establishment of abstraction in Germany. Her commitment was the basis for Winter's later career. From 1952, she traded as Schreiber-Winter and remained a clever and indispensable manager of Winter's artistic work until her death in 1958.

After 1949, Fritz Winter's career took off rapidly: In the same year, he co-founded the artist group Zen 49, and in 1950 he was awarded 2nd prize at the 25th Venice Biennale. This was followed by awards from the cities of Stuttgart and Darmstadt and from the Deutscher Künstlerbund in Berlin. In 1955 he was appointed to the Staatliche Werkakademie in Kassel.

Hedwig Marbach
- Winters Bern gallery owner

The art market also responded to Winter's growing success - particularly through the Marbach Gallery in Bern. The Bernese gallery owner Hedwig Marbach remembers 1968:

"I saw the first originals at the Venice Biennale in 1950 [...] there were two paintings there [...] they spoke of a mature personality, a gifted artist who had gone through a good school. I made the decision to get to know this artist, perhaps to hire him for my gallery"

On her first visit to Winter's studio in Dießen am Ammersee, she met Margarete Schreiber-Rüffer, who showed her a selection of newly created works - three of which she purchased immediately. Shortly afterwards, Marbach signed a contract with Winter and secured a right of first refusal: "For five years, I made the trip to the Ammersee every month to make my choice from the newly created works". The result was not only a close collaboration, but also the largest and probably most exclusive collection of Fritz Winter's works at the time, which is part of the provenance of key works in our current exhibition.

1954/1955
- "Alla Prima" for documenta I.

At the heart of the exhibition are twelve paintings from 1954/1955, all measuring 75 x 100 cm and all from Marbach's collection. The art historian Karlheinz Gabler assigns them to the work phase of the "notation paintings" - paintings that seem like notes turned into images. The term "notation" refers to the recording of fleeting processes such as music, movement or language - a fitting comparison in view of Winter's creative process.

The group of works is complemented by colored and black-and-white chalk and charcoal drawings, which can be read as studies or preliminary stages of these notations. They provide an insight into the artist's formal repertoire and reveal the diversity of his abstract language.

What all the works on display have in common is a consistent reduction to the simplest formal elements. They were created "alla prima", i.e. without subsequent corrections, in free handwriting. They reveal not only Winter's inexhaustible imagination, but also a psychographic quality - as if half a decade's worth of experience is reflected in concentrated form and reduced to a common denominator.

A monumental expression of this "great denominator" reached its temporary climax in the work "Composition in front of blue and yellow". Presented as a mural, it served documenta initiator Arnold Bode as a highly symbolic backdrop for the ceremonial opening of documenta I on July 15, 1955 - a powerful setting for Werner Haftmann's programmatic exclamation:

"Art of the 20th century!"