Rachel Stern2019-06-17T11:54:24-04:00June 17th, 2019|Select Press Coverage|
"Sustained by art through the darkness. Fritz Ascher’s work, now on show in New York, reflects his reclusive, obsessive nature and his turbulent life.” (scroll down for translation into German) Fritz Ascher's "Sunflower", c. 1958. ©Bianca Stock You have probably never heard of Fritz Ascher, a passionate and peculiar painter who, nearly 40 years after his death, is finally getting a smidgen of renown at New York’s Grey Art Gallery. Ascher belonged to a generation of German artists the Nazis hounded into hiding – or worse – leaving a chapter in the history of art truncated and brimming with might-have-beens. He was lucky enough to survive, though the war’s after-effects kept shuddering [...]
Rachel Stern2019-03-26T08:33:22-04:00March 26th, 2019|Select Press Coverage|
NYC-ARTS News: February 28 – March 7 Televised news segment about Fritz Ascher: Expressionist on Channel Thirteen’s NYC-ARTS program. Arts news highlights: “Half the Picture: A Feminist Look at the Collection” at Brooklyn Museum; “Ajijaak on Turtle Island” at The New Victory Theater; “Fritz Ascher: Expressionist” at Grey Art Gallery; “One. One & One” at Baryshnikov Arts Center. AIRED: 3/1/2019 | 0:07:01 Watch Video
Rachel Stern2019-03-26T08:09:16-04:00March 26th, 2019|Select Press Coverage|
"What If? The Life And Work of Fritz Ascher Part II" http://artwithhillary.blogspot.com (scroll down for translation into German) Fritz Ascher (1893 - 1970), Untergehende Sonne (Sunset), c. 1960, oil on canvas, 49.2 × 50 in. ( 125 × 126 cm) Private collection. Photo: Malcolm Varon. © Bianca Stock This is Part II of the blog post on the exhibition Fritz Ascher: Expressionist at New York University's Grey Art Gallery. Please see ArtWithHillary, February 2019 for Part I. From 1942 until the end of the war in 1945, Fritz Ascher (1893 - 1970) was hidden from the Nazis by Martha Grassman (1881 - 1971). Her home was in Grunewald, a famous forest area of Berlin noted for its pine and oak trees. In [...]
Rachel Stern2019-03-26T08:08:38-04:00March 25th, 2019|Select Press Coverage|
"What If? The Life And Work of Fritz Ascher Part I" http://artwithhillary.blogspot.com (scroll down for translation into German) Fritz Ascher (1893 - 1970), Untergehende Sonne (Sunset), c. 1960, oil on canvas, 49.2 × 50 in. ( 125 × 126 cm) Private collection. Photo: Malcolm Varon. © Bianca Stock The current exhibition Fritz Ascher: Expressionist at New York University's Grey Art Gallery is artistically impressive and historically important. Accordingly, ArtWithHillary February 2019 and ArtWithHillary March 2019 are devoted to an account of the show. The artist Fritz Ascher (1893 - 1970) suffered through a horrific period of time from 1933 through 1945 in which he was prohibited from producing art. No one will leave the exhibit without thinking what if the artist had [...]
Rachel Stern2019-02-15T10:25:48-05:00February 15th, 2019|Select Press Coverage|
"Finally Home with the Greats. An exhibition places the under-the-radar Fritz Ascher squarely in the canon of 20th-century German artists.” (scroll down for translation into German) ‘Golgotha’ (1915), by Fritz Ascher, in which inflections of Pieter Bruegel the Elder coalesce with James Ensor to create a scene of pandemonium and horror. ©Bianca Stock For those of us who consider themselves familiar with German Expressionism, the compelling new exhibition at New York University’s Grey Art Gallery, “Fritz Ascher: Expressionist,” makes us wonder why this artist hasn’t been on our radar screens. The 67 works of art on display, along with sketchbooks and documentary materials, may not quite qualify as a discovery, but they significantly [...]
Rachel Stern2020-03-03T09:23:23-05:00January 25th, 2019|Events, Past Events|
Panel Discussion: Expressionism for Our Time New York Studio School, 8 West 8th Street Wednesday, March 6, 6:30–7:30 pm Expressionism for Our Time features a brief history of Western Expressionism by art critic and curator Karen Wilkin, followed by a conversation between contemporary artists Rochelle Feinstein, Judy Glantzman, and Adrianne Rubenstein with art historian Robert Slifkin. Watch the video of the event here. Karen Wilkin is an independent curator and critic, a regular contributor to New Criterion, the Wall Street Journal, and Hudson Review. She teaches the New York Studio School’s MFA art history seminars. Robert Slifkin is Associate Professor of Fine Arts at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. His book Out of Time: Philip Guston and the Refiguration of [...]
Dave2019-04-07T07:43:51-04:00December 20th, 2018|Events, Past Events|
April 3, 2019, 6:30-7:30pm J. English Cook: Gallery Conversation Grey Art Gallery at NYU, New York (please add map) Please join J. English Cook, Graduate Curatorial Assistant, Grey Art Gallery, and Ph.D. Candidate, Institute of Fine Arts, NYU for a gallery conversation. The event is sponsored by the Grey Art Gallery, New York University and The Fritz Ascher Society. It is part of Wunderbar Together: The Year of German-American Friendship 2018/19, an initiative of the Federal Foreign Office of Germany and the Goethe-Institut, with the support of the Federation of German Industries (BDI).
Rachel Stern2018-11-26T05:40:08-05:00September 4th, 2018|Newsletter|
Dear Friends, I know, this summer I seem obsessed with Fritz Ascher’s I know, this summer I seem obsessed with Fritz Ascher’s Dancers from 1921. But there is one more thought about the drawing that I want to share. Fritz Ascher, Dancers, 1921. Private collection. Photo Malcolm Varon ©2018 Bianca Stock Fritz Ascher, Dancers, 1921. Private collection. Photo Malcolm Varon ©2018 Bianca Stock When the drawing was created,“Freikörperkultur” (FKK) or “free body culture” had become popular in Germany. Founded in 1898 in Essen, Germany, the nudist culture was about celebrating the body unencumbered by clothes, in nature and sunlight. Many of the naturists came from the Wandervogel movement, the pre-eminent German youth movement, founded to escape the repressive and [...]
Rachel Stern2018-12-03T16:06:56-05:00May 23rd, 2018|Exhibitions, Past Exhibitions|
The worldwide first Fritz Ascher Retrospective is on view at Museum Schlösschen im Hofgarten in Wertheim/Main until September 9, 2018. Here, a representative group of powerful paintings and drawings spans Ascher's whole oeuvre from first academic studies to monumental Expressionist figure compositions to late landscapes. Fritz Ascher's poems, written while hiding from Nazi persecution, can be discovered as "unpainted paintings" in relation to his artwork. In Wertheim, Ascher’s work can be seen in the context of his supporter Max Liebermann and his teachers Lovis Corinth, Ludwig Dettmann and Curt Agthe, thanks to the Schlösschen’s exquisite collection of Berlin Secession art. (website link) SWR Aktuell reported. (website link) Photos by Elmar Kellner and David Stern. A comprehensive German/English catalogue with [...]
Rachel Stern2018-12-04T11:47:15-05:00March 23rd, 2018|Newsletter|
Dear Friends, I was touched by how many neighbors and friends from near and far came out into the chilly but sunny winter weather on February 21 to celebrate Fritz Ascher and recognize his persecution by the National Socialists by laying a “Stolperstein” (stumbling stone) at Niklasstraße 21/23 in Berlin-Zehlendorf, where his family lived from 1909. Thank you to the anonymous donor for making this event possible, to Dirk Jordan (AG Stolpersteine), Michael Rohrmann (Projekt Stolpersteine) and Wolfgang Ellerbrock for organizing it, to Cornelie von Bismarck for creating a beautiful context, and to Sabine Witt from Museum Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf in Berlin and Jutta Götzmann from Potsdam Museum for supporting it. A special thank you to the students from Potsdam for reciting [...]
Rachel Stern2018-12-04T11:50:09-05:00February 8th, 2018|Newsletter|
Dear Friends, Fritz Ascher is getting a “Stolperstein” (stumbling stone)! Please join us for the ceremony on Wednesday, February 21 at 11:00am at Niklasstr. 21/23 in Berlin-Zehlendorf Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) is a project of the artist Gunter Demnig. The project commemorates people who were persecuted by the Nazis between 1933 and 1945. Stolpersteine are concrete blocks measuring 10x10cm which are laid into the pavement in front of the last voluntarily chosen places of residence of the victims of the Nazis. Their names and fate are engraved into a brass plate on the top of each Stolperstein. In Berlin, thousands Stolpersteine were installed since 1996. Today, Stolpersteine can be found in 1099 German cities and in 20 European countries. (link) We [...]
Rachel Stern2018-12-04T11:57:56-05:00December 27th, 2017|Select Press Coverage|
Fritz-Ascher-Retrospektive „Leben ist Glühn“ Die Wiederentdeckung des Expressionisten Fritz Ascher: eine Doppelausstellung in der Villa Oppenheim und im Potsdam Museum. by Elke Linda Buchholz Einen so vollständig vergessenen Künstler zurückzuholen in die Aufmerksamkeit, braucht Kraft, Geduld und kreative Energie. Vor 30 Jahren stieß die deutsch-amerikanische Kuratorin Rachel Stern bei einem Sammler auf Arbeiten von Fritz Ascher. Sie hatte noch nie von ihm gehört. Jetzt ist sie als quasi weltweit einzige Expertin für den 1893 geborenen Maler wieder zurück in der Stadt, wo auch er einst gelebt und gearbeitet hat. Hier bei Max Liebermann holte der junge Wilde sich als 16-Jähriger nach abgebrochener Schule die höheren Weihen einer Empfehlung an die Königsberger Kunstakademie und startete zwischen Secessionisten und Expressionisten seine Karriere. [...]
