Paul Klee

music (violin)

He spoke of the "rhythm" and "sound" of colours and forms.

💡 Did you know? Klee was a gifted violinist who played almost daily; the structure of music shaped the make-up of his pictures.

journey to Tunisia

On a trip to Tunisia in 1914 the light overwhelmed Klee: „Colour has taken hold of me. I am a painter,“ he wrote.

💡 Did you know? "Colour possesses me. I am a painter," he noted there.

poetic and playful

Some pictures look almost like children's drawings, yet are deeply considered.

💡 Did you know? Klee made almost 10,000 works: from childlike and playful to darkly profound, often with enigmatic titles.

Bauhaus

Kandinsky was his colleague there too.

💡 Did you know? At the Bauhaus Klee gave legendary courses on the theory of form; his notes still fill textbooks today.

Switzerland

Klee grew up in Switzerland but worked long in Germany; German citizenship was denied him.

💡 Did you know? Swiss naturalisation came too late: Klee died in 1940 a few days before it was granted.

1940

Branded „degenerate“ by the Nazis, Klee returned to Switzerland and died in 1940 of a severe skin disease.

💡 Did you know? He created almost ten thousand works and recorded each one.

Angelus Novus

Painted around 1920.

💡 Did you know? The philosopher Walter Benjamin owned the sheet and read it as the „angel of history“: a famous interpretation.

Twittering Machine

Around 1922: a playful, poetic fantasy machine.

💡 Did you know? Bird-like creatures on a crank: the Nazis seized the picture as „degenerate.“

Senecio

Around 1922: a head of fine colour fields, one of his best-known pictures.

💡 Did you know? A round face made of coloured fields: Klee's cheerfully abstract portrait of an old man.

Sumpflegende

Painted around 1919.

💡 Did you know? This picture too was removed from a museum by the Nazis as „degenerate.“

Villa R

Painted around 1919.

💡 Did you know? A large red „R“ anchors the dreamy landscape: letter and image merge.

Highway and Byways

Painted around 1929.

💡 Did you know? Coloured fields as if seen from above: inspired by the order of Egyptian farmland on a journey.

Ad Parnassum

Painted around 1932.

💡 Did you know? Klee's largest picture, made of thousands of coloured dots: a painted mosaic in honour of the mount of the Muses.

Camel (in Rhythmic Landscape with Trees)

Painted around 1920.

💡 Did you know? Trees stand like the lines of a musical staff: Klee's love of music made visible.

Rotating House

Painted around 1921.

💡 Did you know? The house spins dizzyingly: Klee plays cheerfully with gravity and perspective.

Angel, Still Groping

Painted around 1939.

💡 Did you know? From Klee's late period comes a whole series of touchingly clumsy angels.

Cat and Bird

Painted around 1928.

💡 Did you know? The bird sits like a thought in the middle of the cat's forehead; the prey is only a wish.

Limits of Reason

Painted around 1927.

💡 Did you know? Delicate lines strive upward toward a distant sphere: the mind reaches its limit.

Paul Klee

Paul Klee (1879 to 1940) was a German-Swiss painter and Bauhaus teacher whose poetic, playful imagery is unmistakable.

💡 Did you know? Klee created almost 10,000 works and, in his Bauhaus lectures, left one of the most important art theories of modernism.