Lyonel Feininger: Caricature & fantasy and similar items

Wayne State University Press; 1964; Hardcover; Very Good in Very Good- dust jacket; Price clipped jacket else near fine; Additional Details ------------------------------ Product description: Lyonel C. Feininger (1871-1956) was a German-American painter and a leading exponent of Expressionism as well as a caricaturist and comic strip artist. In 1906, The Chicago Tribune traveled to Germany to procure the services of the most popular humor artists. He recruited Feininger to illustrate two comic strips "The Kin-der-Kids" and "Wee Willie Winkie's World" for the Chicago Tribune. The strips were noted for their fey humor and graphic experimentation. When Walter Gropius founded the Bauhaus in Germany in 1919, Feininger was his first faculty appointment, and became the master artist in charge of the printmaking workshop. He designed the cover for the Bauhaus 1919 manifesto. He taught at the Bauhaus for several years. When the Nazi Party came to power in 1933, they declared his work to be "degenerate" and he moved to America. This book is the first one to present Feininger's earlier and later years in proper perspective to his life and work as well as to the various worlds in which he lived. He was the only cartoonist of great artistic stature who contributed at the same time to American, French, and German humor magazines. This book traces Feininger's evolution from cartoonist to painter, concentrating on the individuals, elements , and forces that produced the early work, ranging from political cartoons, caricature and illustration to the manner in which these influences led to Feininger's inevitable shift to painting. Many drawings, cartoons and watercolors are analyzed and evaluated in the light of this development. The great paintings of Feininger's last period in America are discussed, and the basis of their unique blend of lyrical mysticism, child-like wit, and maturity is clearly revealed. The book is further enriched and supplemented by the many letters sent by Feininger to two close friends. The many illustrations, most them never before reproduced in book form, are all thoroughly discussed.