Grunewald Archives - Fritz Ascher Society

Feb 24, 2021

2020 – Rachel Stern (Ed.)
Fritz Ascher. Poesiealbum 357

Rachel Stern2021-02-24T05:40:28-05:00February 24th, 2021|Selected Publications|Comments Off on 2020 – Rachel Stern (Ed.)
Fritz Ascher. Poesiealbum 357

Ascher composed, wrote, drew and painted: Between 1942 and 45 - three long years - he hid from the persecution of the fascists in the basement of a bombed-out house in Berlin-Grunewald. Immobility, loneliness and hunger as well as the fear of betrayal and discovery, torture and death did not leave him during this time. In this situation he found poignant words for his “unpainted pictures”. He conveys both the intensity of his thought processes and his sensitivity for - and his use of - words as well as their nuances and sound patterns. Above all, he demonstrates the indomitable spirit of the artist Fritz Ascher, which no circumstance, regardless of the medium, can prevent from creating with vehement and [...]

Mar 18, 2019

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter #26, March 2019

Rachel Stern2019-03-18T14:20:11-04:00March 18th, 2019|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter #26, March 2019

Dear Friends, Catch it while you can: The exhibition “Fritz Ascher, Expressionist” at the Grey Art Gallery of New York University here in New York is on view only until April 6. You can find installation photos of the exhibition on our website (link). And for the last minute people among you: on April 3 at 6:30pm there is a gallery conversation with J. English Cook, Graduate Curatorial Assistant, Grey Art Gallery, and Ph.D. Candidate, Institute of Fine Arts, NYU. In the exhibition, you can see Fritz Ascher’s gouache “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” It depicts a settlement of 1,100 flats and 800 detached houses in Berlin Zehlendorf that borders the Grunewald city forest in the South. It was built in [...]

Dec 27, 2017

2017, December 22 – Elke Linda Buchholz in tagesspiegel.de

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T11:57:56-05:00December 27th, 2017|Select Press Coverage|Comments Off on 2017, December 22 – Elke Linda Buchholz in tagesspiegel.de

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. [...]

Dec 26, 2017

2017, December 7 – Mathias Richter in Märkische Allgemeine, p. 12

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:05:52-05:00December 26th, 2017|Select Press Coverage|Comments Off on 2017, December 7 – Mathias Richter in Märkische Allgemeine, p. 12

Der vergessene Expressionist Das Potsdam-Museum zeigt Werke des von den Nazis verfolgten Malers Fritz Ascher by Mathias Richter Sie gehören zur sogenannten verlorenen Generation. Künstler wie Gertrude Sandmann, Magda Langenstrass-Uhlig oder Eric Isenburger. Sie hatten Anfang der 30er Jahre grosse Ambitionen und wahrscheinlich eine grosse Karriere vor sich. Doch mit dem Machtantritt von Adolf Hitler erhielten sie Berufsverbot, wurden verfolgt, ihre Werke als "entartete Kunst" verfemt. Wer die Nazi-Zeit überlebte war vergessen und stand vor dem Nichts. Einer der Angehörigen dieser verlorenen Generation ist Fritz Ascher. Das Potsdam-Museum widmet dem radikalen Berliner Expressionisten in Kooperation mit der Villa Oppenheim in Berlin-Charlottenburg von Sonntag an eine Sonderausstellung. 80 Gemälde und Grafiken sind in den beiden Museen zu sehen, davon etwa 50 [...]

Dec 25, 2017

2017, December 7 – Lena Schneider in Potsdamer Neueste Nachrichten, p. 27

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:07:01-05:00December 25th, 2017|Select Press Coverage|Comments Off on 2017, December 7 – Lena Schneider in Potsdamer Neueste Nachrichten, p. 27

Ein Zerrissener Das Potsdam Museum entdeckt Fritz Ascher, der sich in Potsdam vor den Nazis versteckte by Lena Schneider Wer war Fritz Ascher? Das Potsdam Museum hat diesem Unbekannten eine Sonderausstellung gewidmet. „Leben ist glühn“ heißt sie. Ein Bild, das hier hängt, kann man als bestürzende Antwort auf die Frage lesen. „Bajazzo“ heißt es, nach dem italienischen Bruder des Harlekin. Zu sehen ist eine schemenhafte Gestalt, in gelbem Kostüm. Im weiß geschminkten Gesicht ist so etwas wie ein trostloser Schatten des Clownsgenres auszumachen: schwarze Augen, die rot überzogen Mundwinkel krümmen sich nach unten. Das ganze Bild ist wie zerschossen von Farbpunkten. Die Antwort darauf, wer Fritz Ascher, geboren 1893 als Kind jüdischer Eltern, war, findet sich im Entstehungsdatum des Bildes: [...]

Dec 22, 2017

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter #17, December 2017

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:14:23-05:00December 22nd, 2017|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter #17, December 2017

Dear Friends, I am humbled and honored to have received the Lea and Hans Grundig Prize for my work about Fritz Ascher. Right on time for his 125th birthday, the Fritz Ascher retrospective is now open in Berlin and Potsdam, the two places where the artist lived and worked. Museum Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf in der Villa Oppenheim in Berlin exhibits an overview of the artist’s creative development, with a focus on works that relate to Berlin. We see his sketch of the artist Max Liebermann as well as his love for music and performance in Weimar Republic paintings like “Beethoven” and “Bajazzo and Artists”. After surviving the Nazi terror regime in hiding in the Berlin Grunewald neighborhood, he painted these works over [...]

Sep 17, 2017

2017, July 24 – Sven Goldmann in Der Tagesspiegel

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:26:37-05:00September 17th, 2017|Select Press Coverage|Comments Off on 2017, July 24 – Sven Goldmann in Der Tagesspiegel

Der Gezeichnete Sven Goldmann Gefördert von Max Liebermann, geschätzt wie Grosz, Dix und Heartfield – doch es bedurfte des 125. Hertha-Geburtstages, um dem Maler Fritz Ascher neue Aufmerksamkeit zu verschaffen. Schwarze Tusche und Grafit auf Papier: „Fußball konnte er also auch malen.“ Verena Veldes Augen huschen über den Ausstellungskatalog, „Leben ist Glühn“, Abbildung 37 auf Seite 202. Eine Zeichnung mit sechs kräftigen Burschen in knielangen Hosen. Einer kommt von links mit kräftigem Spreizschritt herangestürmt, zu spät, der Ball befindet sich schon in den Händen des Torhüters, der drückt ihn zugleich zärtlich und energisch an sich. Konzentriertes Schweigen am anderen Ende des Tisches. So sah Fußball vor 100 Jahren aus – gar nicht so viel anders als heute. „Gefällt mir“, sagt [...]

Sep 1, 2017

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter #15, August 2017

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:33:00-05:00September 1st, 2017|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter #15, August 2017

Dear Friends, It was fun to attend the opening of “Hauptstadtfussball” at the Ephraim Palais in Berlin, celebrating the 125th anniversary of the Berlin soccer club Herta BSC and its local rivals. I learned so many things about soccer in Berlin, and about Herta BSC in this creative, well researched exhibition. And you can see Fritz Ascher’s “Soccer Players” from c. 1916! It will be on view until January 8, 2018. link Thank you to Sven Goldmann for bringing Fritz Ascher alive in his full page piece in the German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel! link Here in New York, the preparations for “‘Beauteous Strivings.’ Fritz Ascher - Works on Paper” at the New York Studio School are in full swing. The New [...]

Jan 12, 2017

“Leben ist Glühn” Der Expressionist Fritz Ascher  
 Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz MUSEUM GUNZENHAUSER, Chemnitz (Germany)

Rachel Stern2018-12-03T16:21:23-05:00January 12th, 2017|Exhibitions, Past Exhibitions|Comments Off on “Leben ist Glühn” Der Expressionist Fritz Ascher  
 Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz MUSEUM GUNZENHAUSER, Chemnitz (Germany)

The worldwide first Fritz Ascher Retrospective is on view at the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz - MUSEUM GUNZENHAUSER from March 5 to June 18, 2017. (website link) The main focus of the presentation at the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz - MUSEUM GUNZENHAUSER is on the artist's important early masterworks like "Golgatha" (1915), "Bajazzo and Artists" (ca. 1916) and "The Tortured" (ca. 1916). For the first time ever, Fritz Ascher’s “Golem” from the collection of the Jewish Museum Berlin will here be reunited with other works the artist created between 1913 and 1933. The Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz is home to an important collection of German Expressionism, dominated by artwork of the locally founded Expressionist group Brücke and especially Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, who grew up in Chemnitz, along [...]

May 19, 2016

Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art

Newsletter #6, May 2016

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:44:40-05:00May 19th, 2016|Newsletter|Comments Off on Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art

Newsletter #6, May 2016

Dear Friends, As we are drawn to spend more time outside in the lovely spring weather, this newsletter is all about Fritz Ascher’s late landscapes that became the focus of his work after 1945. Trees, late 1950s ©Bianca Stock, Munich Frank Auerbach, Mornington Crescent Looking South, 1997 ©Frank Auerbach, courtesy Marlborough Fine Art In dozens and dozens of intense paintings and gouaches intoxicated with color, Ascher turns to nature painting in the broadest sense. Among them are landscapes, woodland scenes, portraits of individual trees, groups of trees, all inspired by hours of walking in the nearby Grunewald. In his catalogue essay accompanying the upcoming Fritz Ascher retrospective, Eckhart Gillen relates the aesthetic practice and behavior of the two painters Fritz [...]

Dec 17, 2015

Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art

Newsletter #4 December 2015

Rachel Stern2018-12-04T12:45:51-05:00December 17th, 2015|Newsletter|Comments Off on Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art

Newsletter #4 December 2015

Dear Friends, As the days are getting shorter and darker, and will at some point probably get colder as well, I remember fondly this past summer, when I had the chance to discover the vastness and diversity of the Grunewald, the largest city forest in Berlin, with Dr. Gudrun Rademacher, the long term director of the Forest Museum Grunewald. Within minutes Fritz Ascher was there, and he often walked for hours, usually in the early mornings or late at night. He documents in his art what he sees: heavy-trunked trees stand in open landscape, shaken by the wind, deep in leaf, or winterly bare. Dr. Rademacher discovered gouaches of the Forest Museum, the Hunting Castle with its signature orange roof, [...]

Jan 18, 2015

2015, January 12 – Ori Z. Soltes in plundered-art.blogspot.com

Rachel Stern2021-02-25T04:48:57-05:00January 18th, 2015|Select Press Coverage|Comments Off on 2015, January 12 – Ori Z. Soltes in plundered-art.blogspot.com

Fritz Ascher: from Golems to Landscapes by Ori Z. Soltes Given the enormous number of people who were victimized during the Holocaust—both those who perished and those who somehow did not—it should not surprise us that, as time goes by, narratives still continue to emerge reflecting the varied experiences of these victims and their tormentors or saviors. Among these there are many artists—artists, like Felix Nussbaum (1904-1944), who were producing high-level work, and others less skilled—who did not survive but left behind bodies of work that provoke the question: what if? Had these artists not been destroyed by the Nazis, what might they have accomplished and what songs of praise might art historians now be singing about them? There [...]