Fritz Winter

Exhibitions/literature:
Fritz Winter. Formwerdend. Malerei und Zeichnung, Niebüll, Richard-Haizmann-Museum; Sonderborg, Sonderjyllands Kunstmuseum; Landshut, Rathauskeller; Ahlen, Fritz-Winter-Haus; Diessen/Ammersee, Fritz-Winter-Atelier, 2001/02, cat. no. 15, p. 52, ill. p. 53
Fritz Winter. Durchbruch zur Farbe, 30 August 2020 – 19 August 2021, Emil Schumacher Museum, Hagen, cat. p. 48
Fritz Winter. Durchburch zur Farbe, 7 November 2021 – 6 February 2022, Angermuseum, Erfurt

Who restricts reality? We do! Who expands it? We do too!”
Fritz Winter, 1935

Winter’s first compositions set against a dark ground evolved from his abstract still lifes in 1931/32 and were to remain a defining feature of his work throughout the 1930s. In 1932, the series of Constellations and the ‘Biomorphic Ovals’ emerged almost simultaneously. The surfaces are sometimes matt, while at other times they appear to be sealed with glossy black lacquer, revealing the full aesthetic appeal of their material qualities only when viewed in the original. Rarely have microcosm and macrocosm been brought so close together as in these images of cells and constellations.

The composer Hellmuth Christian Wolff, who became a close friend of the painter in Halle, later recalled their time together: ‘At the time, he liked to describe himself as a “Romantic”, with whom he indeed had much in common, particularly in his connection with impressions of nature. He was extraordinarily industrious and was only able to endure the period after 1933 by painting almost obsessively …’

In the years that followed, when the artist was no longer able to exhibit his work in Germany, he intensified and varied the central motifs of construction and transparency in monochrome compositions characterised by strong contrasts of light and dark.

Dr. Anna Rühl, Fritz Winter Stiftung, Munich