Hermann Scherer
Grooves and Edges
The last two and a half years in the life of Baselbased Expressionist Hermann Scherer (1893–1927) were central to his oeuvre. It was during this time that Scherer came into his own as an artist, decisively shedding his earlier influences (Aristide Maillol, Carl Burkhardt, Auguste Rodin) in order to set off on a radical new path inspired by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. Significantly, the period coincides with the trained stonemason’s first forays into wood.
In focusing on the artist’s work in this medium, the exhibition examines this extraordinarily productive time of upheaval in the artist’s life, one that yielded over a hundred woodcuts and more than twenty-five wood sculptures. For the first time, the fifty-four printing blocks on loan to the Kunstmuseum Basel for more than eighty years will be shown in public alongside prints taken from those blocks.
The medium of the woodcut print led Scherer to an abstracting reduction of form. Curving silhouettes gave way to sharp angular forms and the energetic tracks of the slashing gesture, which also influenced his manner of drawing and painting. Druck (which means not only “print” but also “pressure”) is thus a multivalent theme of the exhibition — not only in the sense of the experimental character of making prints by hand on different papers but also in the energetic, powerful chipping and notching that the artist brought to his wooden pieces. It was in woodcut that Scherer’s core life themes – love and libido; togetherness and loneliness, existential angst and excess — found their most acute expression.
The exhibition will subsequently be shown n a modified version at the Bündner Kunstmuseum Chur (18 June - 25 September 2022) and at the Ernst Barlach Haus, Hamburg (5 March - 5 June 2023).
A selection of the printing blocks have been scanned in 3-D in advance of this exhibition. Here you can follow the traces of Scherer's cutting tools close up:
Online ticket
Get your ticket for the exhibition visit here.
The exhibition is supported by:
- Samuel Werenfels, Basel
- Stiftung für das Kunstmuseum Basel
Hermann Scherer
Hermann Scherer was born in 1893 in Rümmingen in the Markgräflerland. After training as a stonemason in Lörrach, he initially worked for the Basel sculptors Carl Gutknecht and Otto Roos between 1910 and 1919. Starting in 1918 he assisted Carl Burckhardt in the execution of the two fountain sculptures, Rhine and Wiese, in front of the Badischer Bahnhof in Basel. In 1920 Scherer had his first opportunity to exhibit his sculptural work in stone and plaster at the Kunsthalle Basel. He began to paint in 1920. His first attempts at painting included portraits, nudes and landscapes. In 1923 he met Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and subsequently spent several extended periods with him in Davos, where he produced his first wood sculptures and woodcuts.
On New Year's Eve 1924/1925, Scherer, together with Paul Camenisch and Albert Müller, founded the Basel artists' group Rot-Blau (Red-Blue), which had close ties to Expressionism. In the fall of 1926, Scherer fell ill. He died in Basel on May 13, 1927. The Kunsthalle Basel mounted a large memorial exhibition in February 1928.
Katalog
Hermann Scherer (1893–1927) ist eine der zentralen Figuren des Expressionismus in der Schweiz. Erstmals erscheint nun eine Monografie, die ausschliesslich Scherers Holzschnitten und deren Bedeutung in seinem Schaffen gewidmet ist. Herausgegeben von Marion Heisterberg und Stephan Kunz. Mit Beiträgen von Margitta Brinkmann, Marion Heisterberg, Wolfgang Kersten, Stephan Kunz und Martin Schwander, ca. 192 Seiten, ca. 150 farbige und s/w-Abbildungen.
