Josef Albers

Painter and designer, born in Bottrop, W Germany. He trained in Berlin, Essen, and Munich, and from 1920 was involved with the Bauhaus. In 1933 he fled Nazi Germany to the USA, teaching at the experimental Black Mountain College, NC (1933–49) and at Yale (1950–60). He became a US citizen in 1939. As a painter he was interested chiefly in colour relationships, and from 1950 produced a series of wholly abstract canvases, ‘Homage to the Square’, exploring this theme with great subtlety.

Josef Albers (born March 19, 1888 in Bottrop, Westphalia (Germany) - died March 26, 1976 in New Haven, Connecticut), was a German artist and educator whose work, both in Europe and in the United States, formed the basis of some of the most influential and far-reaching art education programs of the 20th century.

Albers studied art in Berlin, Essen, and Munich before enrolling as a student at the prestigious Weimar Bauhaus in 1920.

With the closure of the Bauhaus under Nazi pressure in 1933, Albers emigrated to the United States and joined the faculty of Black Mountain College, North Carolina, where he ran the painting program until 1949. In 1950 Albers left Black Mountain to head the Department of Design at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut until he retired from teaching in 1958. Albers continued to paint and write, staying in New Haven with his wife, textile artist Anni Albers, until his death.

Accomplished as a designer, photographer, typographer, printmaker and poet, Albers is best remembered for his work as an abstract painter and theorist. In this rigorous series, begun in 1949, Albers explored chromatic interactions with flat colored squares arranged concentrically on the canvas.

Albers' theories on art and education were formative for the next generation of artists.

The Josef and Anni Albers Foundation are represented by Waddington Galleries and Alan Cristea Gallery London.