Exhibition
ANNI ALBERS: PRINTS AND STUDIES - Alan Cristea Gallery
Albers was born Annelise Else Frieda Fleischmann in Berlin. Her mother was from an aristocratic family in the publishing industry and her father was a furnituremaker. Even in her childhood, she was intrigued by art and the visual world. She painted during her youth and studied under an impressionist from 1916 to 1919, but was very discouraged from continuing after a meeting with artist Oskar Kokoschka, who upon seeing a portrait of hers asked her sharply "Why do you paint?" She eventually decided to attend art school, even though the challenges for art students were often great and the living conditions harsh. Such a lifestyle sharply contrasted the affluent and comfortable living that she had been used to. Albers attended the Kunstgewerbeschule in Hamburg for only two months in 1920, though eventually made her way to the Bauhaus at Weimar in April 1922.
At Walter Gropius's Bauhaus she began her first year under Georg Muche and then Johannes Itten. Women were barred from certain disciplines taught at the school, especially architecture, and during her second year, unable to get into a glass workshop with future husband Josef Albers, Anni Albers deferred reluctantly to weaving. With her instructor Gunta Stölzl, however, Albers soon learned to love weaving's tactile construction challenges.
