
Hermann Stenner (12 March 1891,
Bielefeld
Bielefeld () is a city in the Ostwestfalen-Lippe Region in the north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population of 341,755, it is also the most populous city in the administrative region () of Detmold (region), Detmold and the L ...
– 5 December 1914, near
Iłów (German: Enlau)) was a German
Expressionist painter and graphic artist.
Biography

His father, Hugo, was a decorative painter. He attended the local Arts and Crafts school and honed his skills by making copies of old paintings. In 1909, he passed the entrance examination at the
Academy of Fine Arts, Munich
The Academy of Fine Arts, Munich (, also known as Munich Academy) is one of the oldest and most significant art academies in Germany. It is located in the Maxvorstadt district of Munich, in Bavaria, Germany.
In the second half of the 19th centur ...
, and was assigned to the drawing class of
Heinrich Knirr
Heinrich Knirr (2 September 1862 – 26 May 1944) was an Austrian Empire-born German painter, known for his genre scenes and portraits, although he also did landscapes and still-lifes. He is best known for creating the official portrait of Adolf ...
. That summer, he spent some time with
Hans von Hayek at his art school in
Dachau. Both Von Hayek and Knirr recommended that he leave Munich to study with
Christian Landenberger in
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; ; Swabian German, Swabian: ; Alemannic German, Alemannic: ; Italian language, Italian: ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, largest city of the States of Germany, German state of ...
.
In 1910, he enrolled at the
State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart. After a year of study with Landenberger, he took
composition
Composition or Compositions may refer to:
Arts and literature
*Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography
* Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include ...
classes from
Adolf Hölzel, whose teaching methods differed from anything he had experienced before; treating art as a type of science. In 1912, he became one of Hölzel's master pupils at his studio in the garden of
Stuttgart Castle. Later that year, he spent four weeks with his friends in Paris.
In 1913, he was invited to exhibit at the first Expressionist art exhibition in
Dresden
Dresden (; ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; , ) is the capital city of the States of Germany, German state of Saxony and its second most populous city after Leipzig. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, 12th most p ...
. That same year, Hölzel was able to secure him a position painting murals in the main lobby of the upcoming
Werkbund Exhibition, where he worked with
Oskar Schlemmer and
Willi Baumeister. The response to their work ranged from enthusiastic praise to categorical rejection.
Following the outbreak of World War I, Stenner and Schlemmer volunteered and were assigned to Grenadier Regiment #119 ("Königin Olga"). After serving for two months on the
Western Front, the regiment was transferred to the
Eastern Front in
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
, where he was killed during an attack on Iłów in
Sochaczew County
__NOTOC__
Sochaczew County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Masovian Voivodeship, east-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passed in 1 ...
in the
Masovian Voivodeship
Masovian Voivodeship or Mazowieckie Province (, ) and any variation thereof, is a Voivodeships of Poland, voivodeship (province) in east-central Poland, containing Poland's capital Warsaw.
Masovian Voivodeship has an area of and had a 2019 po ...
.
Despite his short working life, he was able to create 280 paintings and over 1,500 drawings. In March, 2016, on the 125th anniversary of his birth, the Villa Weber in Bielefeld officially became the Hermann-Stenner-Haus museum. The core of the collection was provided by Hermann-Josef Bunte, a legal scholar and art collector.
"Refugium für Expressionisten"
by Christiane Fricke @ ''Handelsblatt
The ''Handelsblatt'' (literally "commerce paper" in English) is a German-language business newspaper published in Düsseldorf by Handelsblatt Media Group, formerly known as Verlagsgruppe Handelsblatt.
History and profile
''Handelsblatt'' was es ...
'', 12/8/2015
Selected paintings
File:Stenner sitzender akt.jpg, Sitting Nude
File:Auferstehung.jpg, Resurrection
File:Kaffeegarten am Ammersee.jpg, Café Garden at Ammersee
Ammersee (; English: Lake Ammer) is a '' Zungenbecken'' lake in Upper Bavaria, Germany, southwest of Munich between the towns of Herrsching and Dießen am Ammersee. With a surface area of approximately , it is the sixth largest lake in Germany ...
File:Hermann Stenner Grüne Frau mit gelbem Hut II 1913.jpg, Green Woman with Yellow Hat
References
*Stenner, Hermann. In: Ulrich Thieme, Felix Becker et al.: '' Allgemeines Lexikon der Bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart''. Vol.31, E. A. Seemann, Leipzig 1937, pg.593.
*Stenner, Hermann. In: Hans Vollmer: ''Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler des XX. Jahrhunderts''. Vol.4. E. A. Seemann, Leipzig 1958, pg.357
Further reading
* Jutta Hülsewig-Johnen and Nicole Peterlein (eds.): ''Hermann Stenner – Aquarelle und Zeichnungen'' (watercolors and drawings), Prestel Verlag, 2010, .
* ''Hermann Stenner 1891–1914. Von Bielefeld nach Meersburg – Ein Maler an der Schwelle zur Moderne.'' (exhibition catalog, Achberg Castle) 2007, .
* Karin von Maur and Markus Pöhlmann (eds.), ''Der Maler Hermann Stenner im Spiegel seiner Korrespondenz. Briefe 1909–1914.'' (letters) Prestel Verlag, 2006, .
* Jutta Hülsewig-Johnen and Christiane Reipschläger (eds.): ''Hermann Stenner – Werkverzeichnis der Gemälde.'' (working drawings), Auflage. 2005, .
* David Riedel: ''"Noch einen Sommer intensives Schaffen" – Hermann Stenners Werk vor dem Ersten Weltkrieg.'' Chapter from ''Sie starben jung! Künstler und Dichter, Ideen und Ideale vor dem Ersten Weltkrieg.'' (They Died Young) edited by Friederike Weimar and Burcu Dogramaci, Gebrüder Mann Verlag, 2014, .
External links
Hermann Stenner website
with biography and paintings by year.
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stenner, Hermann
1891 births
1914 deaths
20th-century German male artists
20th-century German painters
German Expressionist painters
German graphic designers
German male painters
German military personnel killed in World War I
People from Bielefeld
State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart alumni