A Look At Johannes Itten English Literature Essay

A Look At Johannes Itten English Literature Essay The Bauhaus art connoisseur that I chose as a subject to study is Johannes Itten. He was a visionary color and art theorist who developed color wheel and stars which are widely studied by art students. He also delved into spiritual and psychological aspect of color. I feel deeply connected to his work as the first step towards understanding art is to understand color. I feel Johannes Itten’s simplistic approach towards embracing color and portraying his sensitivity in his artwork is quite palpable and that is the reason I feel the need to learn more about his artwork and color theories. Where are they located? When were they born? What was the world like when they were working? Johannes Itten was born on 11th Nov, 1888 in SÃ ¼dern-Lindern, Switzerland in a school teacher’s family. After realizing his passion for Arts he moved to Vienna for art studies in 1916 and then moved to Weimar in 1919 to teach in the Bauhaus. It was a competitive world when Johannes Itten lived . Europe was war trodden and people laid more emphasis on wages and savings then cultivating artistic aptitude. Although Johannes Itten somehow escaped the horrors of war, most of the artist, painters, architect during that period had to forcibly enrol in the war. In the art world people were sceptic of new ideas and that was one of the main reasons of his expulsion from the Bauhaus. Art and craft was thriving in that period and graphic designing grew bold with experiments in typography, calligraphy and photography etc which led to a sudden interest in graphic designing. Did they go to school? Where? What did they study? Since Johannes Itten was a teacher’s son he trained as a primary school teacher to pursue a career in the field. Itten however realized that teaching primary school was not his thing and that he has predilection for color and arts. Under parental pressure he decided to take Diploma in mathematics and science to teach at a secondary school, but not before taki ng a semester at Geneva Ecole des Beaux – Arts in Genf. It was after studying there that he realized his inclination towards arts. He then studied under Adolf HÃ ¶lzel in Stuttgart. After finishing his studies he moved to Vienna in 1916 where he met Walter Gropius in 1919 (founder of the Bauhaus) who extended him the invitation to lecture at the Bauhaus in Weimar. In 1926, however, after falling out with Gropius Walter, Johannes Itten established an art school in Berlin to train architects, artists, painters and photographers. From 1932 to 1938 Itten taught at the Krefeld School of Textile Design, where he edified industrial designers. He became the director of the Museum and Institute of Arts and Crafts in Zurich before retiring in 1955. Having being fully dedicated to the teaching institutes Itten never found much time to devote to his own creations until 1955, after retirement however he became more prolific then before. He died in Zurich in 1967. Can you define the desig ner’s philosophy in his/her work (i.e. did they follow or create a certain movement?) What type of work did they do?