Thilo Maatsch (1900-1983): Untitled (1924)

Artist
Thilo Maatsch
 
Title
Untitled 
 
Medium
Woodcut
 
Material 
Verge Paper
 
Dimensions
15.5 x 14.5 cm
 
Editor
Edition Panderma, Basel
 
Year
1924, published 1966
 
Signature
Signed in pencil 
 
Provenance
Edition Panderma, Carl Laszlo, Basel
Galerie von Bartha, Basel
Private Collection, Basel
 
Condition / Restauration 
mint archival condition 
 
Biography: 
Thilo Friedrich Maatsch (1900-1983) was a German constructivist and concrete artist. He founded with Johannes Molzahn and Rudolf Jahns the "Gesellschaft der Freunde junger Kunst" (Society of the adorer of young art) in 1918 which were joined by several distinguished artist as e.g. Lyonel Feininger and Paul Klee. The collector Otto Ralfs supported the society and Kandinsky designed the signet. Maatsch's circle of friends and acquaintances ranked among László Moholy-Nagy, William Wauer and Lothar Schreyer. Kandinsky nurtured Maatsch's talent and he admired him like his own father. Due to financial problems it was not possible for Maatsch to study at the Bauhaus, because of his young family he also had to nourish. But his desire for studies remained not any longer unfulfilled. Moholy-Nagy, Kandinsky and Klee permitted him to study in their studios. Most probably Kandinsky together with the Bauhaus figuered out a permission for Maatsch to attend Bauhaus in Berlin and Weimar in his holidays (he worked as a teacher in Königslutter) without paying fees. In 1925 he joined the November Group and from this year onwards till 1932 he participated annually in the renowned "Große Berliner Kunstausstellung". In 1927 Herwarth Walden, one of the most important discoverers and promoters of German avant-garde art in the early twentieth century, arranged for Maatsch an exhibition in his prestigious gallery "Der Sturm". Determined by the Nazi policy his art work was considered as degenerated and he withered on the vine.