BERNHARD HOETGER

Designer: Bernhard Hoetger

Year: ca 1927

Material: beech, rush

Dimensions: height 70.5 cm, width 53 cm, depth 60 cm, seat height: 40 cm

Price: on request

This chair formed part of the furnishings of the Paula Modersohn-Becker House in Böttcherstrasse in Bremen, an architectural highlight of Expressionist German architecture. The house was conceived by the sculptor Bernhard Hoetger in the form of a gesamtkunstwerk and was part of the unified architectural setting of Böttcherstrasse, including restaurants, elegant clubs, workshops, and a museum to house the collection of the initiator and sponsor of the entire complex, the Bremen-based entrepreneur Ludwig Roselin. Roselin was the owner of the Kaffee HAAG company and an admirer of the painter Paula Modersohn-Becker in Worpswede.

The chair is in excellent condition considering it’s age. The shape is characterized by organic formed seating and woven rush back which is rested on wooden pillars.

This chair reflects the design language of Hoetger's "Worpsweder Möbeln" of the 1920s, strong construction and return to the original craftsmanship with Nordic touch.

Bernhard Hoetger

(4 May 1874 in Dortmund – 18 July 1949 in Interlaken) was a German sculptor, painter and handicrafts artist of the Expressionist movement.

Life

Hoetger was the son of a Dortmund blacksmith, he studied sculpture in Detmold from 1888 to 1892, before directing a workshop in Rheda-Wiedenbrück. After a spell at the Düsseldorf Arts Academy, he took a trip to Paris, where he was deeply influenced by Auguste Rodin, but also got to know Paula Modersohn-Becker. Later he was able to familiarise himself with Antoni Gaudí. In 1911, Hoetger was called up to the Darmstadt Artists’ Colony, where he was to remain for some time.

Böttcherstraße

In 1914, inspired by Modersohn-Becker, he moved to Worpswede. It was here where he met the Bremen entrepreneur Ludwig Roselius, with whom he would go on to make his masterpiece, Bremen's Böttcherstraße, in an Expressionist style. In particular he was responsible for the Atlantis House, which reflected the race-theories of the Nazi ethnographer Herman Wirth.

HAG-TURM

He also designed the HAG-TURM, a building sponsored by Roselius's firm Kaffee HAG at the 1928 Pressa International Press Exhibition. The HAG-Turm was a 42-metre (138 ft) tower. This was built in 70 days.The building had ten storeys which contained all the working machinery necessary to create a working factory. 37 flags were on display on the front of tower representing the global reach of the company. Statistical and historical information was provided about coffee production, highlighting the part played by Café HAG. Scientific and medical experts were also present to provide further information to the public. Café HAG had become famous for their process of decaffination and so there was also information about the bad effects of caffeine on human and animal health.

Literature: M. Anczykowski, Bernhard Hoetger. Skulptur Malerei Design Architektur, catalogue accompanying the exhibitions in Bremen, Berlin, and Darmstadt, Bremen 1998, p. 277, fig. 206