biografia di Anni ALBERS (1899-1994)

Birth place: Berlin, Germany

Addresses: Black Mountain, NC, 1933-49; Orange, CT, from 1950

Profession: Designer, craftsperson, graphic artist, printmaker, teacher, author, lecturer

Studied: A. Sch., Berlin, with Martin Brandenburg, 1916-19; A. Acad., Hamburg, 1919-20; Bauhaus, Weimar and Dessau, Ger., 1922-29 (married teacher Josef Albers in 1925); Md. Inst. Col. Art, DFA, 1972.

Exhibited: MoMA, 1938-39 (Bauhaus exh.), 1949-53 (traveling exh. textiles), 1949 (solo textile exh.,); Golden Gate Expo., 1939; Intl. Textile Exh., Univ. N.C., 1945; Cranbrook Acad. A., 1946; MIT, 1946; Carnegie Inst Technol., Pittsburgh, Pa, 1959; Yale Univ Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn.; Honolulu Acad Art, Hawaii, 1954; Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin, 1975; BMA, 1959. Awards: Gold medal, Am Inst Architects, 1961; citation, Philadelphia Col Art, 1962; Tamarind Lithography Workshop Fel, Los Angeles, 1964.

Work: MMA; MoMA; AIC; Mus. Zwickau; Nat. Mus., Munich; Victoria & Albert Mus, London, Eng.; BMA. Commissions: Mem to Nazi victims, comn by List Family for Jewish Mus.; Ark Curtain, Dallas.

Comments: A Bauhaus student in the 1920s, she married her professor Josef Albers in 1925; the two came to the U.S. in 1933 after the Bauhaus was shut down by the Nazis. The Albers joined the faculty at Black Mountain College that same year. A textile weaver for most of her career; she took up printmaking in the 1960s. Teaching: asst. prof. art, Black Mountain Col.,1933-1949 (established and ran the weaving workshop); designed textiles for industry after 1950; also lectured at leading univs & mus., incl Univ. Hawaii, 1954; SFMA, 1954; de Cordova and Dana Mus.,1955; Yale Univ.,1955; Brooklyn Mus.,1958; Syracuse Univ.,1958. Auth., Work with Material" (Black Mountain College, 1938); "The Weaving Workshop," in Bauhaus, 1919-28 (exh. cat. MoMA, 1938); Anni Albers: On Designing (Wesleyan Univ Press, 1962 & 1971); Anni Albers: On Weaving (Wesleyan Univ Press, 1965 & 1972); Anni Albers: Pre-Columbian Mexican Miniatures (Praeger, 1970).

Sources: WW73; WW47; Petteys, Dictionary of Women Artists; Rubinstein, American Women Artists, 246-47"