Heimrad Prem

Heimrad Prem (27 May 1934 – 19 February 1978) was a German painter born in Roding,

Oberpfalz The Upper Palatinate (german: Oberpfalz, , ) is one of the seven administrative districts of Bavaria, Germany, and is located in the east of Bavaria. Geography The Upper Palatinate is a landscape with low mountains and numerous ponds and lakes ...

. From 1949–1952 he studied decorative painting at

Schwandorf Schwandorf is a town on the river Naab in the Upper Palatinate, Bavaria, Germany, which is the seat of the Schwandorf district. Sights * Catholic parish church of St. Jakob * Kreuzberg Church: Catholic parish, monastic and pilgrimage church of ...

and then studied painting with Josef Oberberger and sculpture with Toni Stadler at the

Akademie der Bildenden Künste The Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (german: link=no, Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien) is a public art school in Vienna, Austria. History The Academy of Fine Arts Vienna was founded in 1692 as a private academy modelled on the Accademia di Sa ...

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

until 1956. While studying painting with

Ernst Schumacher Ernst Friedrich Schumacher (16 August 1911 – 4 September 1977) was a German-British statistician and economist who is best known for his proposals for human-scale, decentralised and appropriate technologies.Biography on the inner dustjacke ...

at the

Hochschule der Künste The Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK; also known in English as the Berlin University of the Arts), situated in Berlin, Germany, is the largest art school in Europe. It is a public art and design school, and one of the four research universit ...

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

, he formed

Gruppe SPUR Gruppe SPUR was an artistic collaboration formed by the German painters Heimrad Prem, Helmut Sturm, and Hans-Peter Zimmer, and the sculptor Lothar Fischer in 1957. They published a journal of the same name ''Spur''. ''Spur'' was subject to pr ...

with Lothar Fischer,

Helmut Sturm Helmut Sturm (21 February 1932 – 20 February 2008) was a German painter. He was born in Furth im Wald. From 1952 to 1958, he studied at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste, Munich. After this he joined Heimrad Prem, Lothar Fischer and Hans- ...

, and

Hans-Peter Zimmer Hans-Peter Zimmer (23 October 1936 - 5 September 1992) was a German painter and sculptor. He was born in Berlin and studied at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich. He formed Gruppe SPUR in 1957 with the painters Heimrad Prem, Helmut Sturm and the ...

. After meeting

Asger Jorn Asger Oluf Jorn (3 March 1914 – 1 May 1973) was a Danish painter, sculptor, ceramic artist, and author. He was a founding member of the avant-garde movement COBRA and the Situationist International. He was born in Vejrum, in the northwest c ...

, SPUR joined the Situationist International. In 1960 he won a scholarship of the Kulturpreises im Bundesverband der Deutschen Industrie,

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

. From 1960–1962 he co-edited the magazine ''SPUR''. In 1961 he visited Oerkelljunga, Sweden with Sturm, Zimmer and

Dieter Kunzelmann Dieter Kunzelmann (14 July 1939 – 14 May 2018) was a German left-wing terrorist. In the early 1960s he was a member of the Situationist-inspired artists' group Gruppe SPUR. He was one of the founders of Kommune 1 in 1967. At the end of th ...

staying with

Jørgen Nash Jørgen Nash (March 16, 1920 – May 17, 2004) was a Danish artist, writer and central proponent of Situationism. Life He was born in Vejrum, Jutland, Denmark, baptized Jørgen Axel Jørgensen, the brother of Asger Jorn. He later changed hi ...

. In 1962 the SPUR group was expelled from the Situationist International, but they continued to work with Nash and others. In 1963 he worked on the SPUR collaborative works: "Canale Grande Crescente" for the exhibition "Visione e Colore" in the Palazzo Grassi,

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...

, the SPUR-Bau joint contribution to the exhibition "Nouveaux Espaces", Biennale Paris, and the "SPUR room" in the country house of Willi Bleicher with Munich. His first solo exhibition in the Galerie van de Loo,

was also in 1963. In 1965 the group SPUR fused with ''Wir'' to form the group ''Geflecht'' (Network). After a short stay in South Sweden, Prem organised the organization of "white celebration" near Munich and began to paint under the influence of drugs. After his first suicide attempt in 1971 he traveled in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...

and

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

. In 1975 he became a joint founder of the artists' community ''Kollektiv Herzogstrasse''. He became a lecturer at the winter academy in the Schloss Kißlegg. In 1976 he had a special exhibition at the Haus der Kunst, Munich. The following year he exhibited in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

. Following this, he continued to exhibit work mainly in

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. Heimrad Prem committed suicide in 1978 in Munich. {{DEFAULTSORT:Prem, Heimrad 1934 births 1978 deaths People from Cham (district) Suicides in Germany Painters who committed suicide 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists German male painters Academy of Fine Arts, Munich alumni 1978 suicides