OUGD404 - Josef Albers

OUGD404

Josef Albers

Josef Albers was born in 1888 in Bottrop, Germany. He worked as a school teacher, and printmaker before enrolling in the Weimar Bauhaus in 1920. He then joined the teaching staff at the Bauhaus as a maker of stained glass before teaching in the preliminary course ‘Werklehre' of the department of design. In 1925 Albers was promoted to professor. In 1933 the Bauhaus closed due to pressure from the Nazis and Josef moved to America. In America he became head of painting at the Black Mountain College in North Carolina until 1949. Finally, Albers headed the department of design at Yale University until 1958 when he retired. Albers played a very important part in bringing the principles of European Modernism to America, especially those associated with the Bauhaus.

In 1963 Josef produced a booked titled ‘Interaction of Colour’. The book is a comprehensive examination of the function and perception if colour.  His book strongly influenced art education and practice in the 20^th century as well as Color Field Painting and Minimalism.

Beginning in 1949 and produced until his death, Albers created a series called ‘Homage to the Square’. In this series he used a single geometric shape to systematically explore the range of effects that could be produced by only altering the colour and spatial relationship. He chose a shape that in his opinion was without any sense of symbolism in order to experiment with the ‘relativity’ of colour. He did this using juxtaposition, placement and interaction with other colours. This produced the illusion of attraction, resistance, weight and movement.