Friedrich Vordemberge-Gildewart (1899-1962)

1899 Born November 17 in Osnabrück. After his school education was apprenticed to a carpenter.

1919 Studied interior design, sculpture and architecture at the Hanover School of Art and the Technical College, Hanover.
First abstract works (reliefs, design for sculpture).

1922-23 Worked on architectural ceramics for buildings. Developed his concepts in drawings, collages and first pictorial constructions.

1924 Studio in the house of the Kestner Gesellschaft.
Founded ‘Gruppe K’ (together with Hans Nitschke).
Exhibition of Gruppe K in Kestner Gesellschaft Hanover.
Meeting with Schwitters, Arp and Van Doesburg.
Member of ‘Der Sturm’ Berlin.

1925 Member of De Stijl, Leiden.
Gruppe K exhibits at Der Sturm, Berlin.
Exhibited inL’Art d’Aujourd’hui in Paris. Met Vantongerloo, Brancusi, Man Ray and Tristan Tzara. Participated in the Great Berlin Exhibition, Lehrter Railway Station, Berlin.

1926-27 Participated in the exhibition Société Anonyme, Brooklyn, New York.

1927 Founder member (together with Kurt Schwitters and Carl Buchheister) of ‘die abstrakten hannover’ and association of commercial designers ‘ring neuer werbegestalter’. Exhibited inWays and Directions of Abstract Painting in Europe, Städtische Kunsthalle, Mannheim.

1929 First one-man exhibition at Galerie Povolozky, Paris. Participated in Abstract and Surrealist Painting and Sculpture, Kunsthaus Zurich.

1930 Participated in the first international exhibition of ‘Cercle et Carré’, Paris and in Vision and Laws of Form, Galerie Ferdinand Möller, Berlin.

1931 Participated in 4ème Salon des Indépendants, Bordaux.

1932 Founder member of ‘Abstraction-Création’, Paris.
Marries Ilse Leda.

1934 One-man exhibition at Bragaglia Fuori Commerciol, Rome and Galleria del Milione, Milan.

1936-37 Lived in Berlin

1937 Particpates in Konstruktisten at Kunsthalle, Basle.

1937-38 Short stay in Switzerland.

1938 Emigration to Amsterdam, became friendly with Max Beckmann.
Some works in Entartete Kunst (Degenerate Art) exhibition in Berlin.
Abstracte Kunst, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam.
Modern German Art, New Burlington Gallery, London.

1939 Art of Tomorrow Collection of Non-Objective Paintings, Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York
Réalités Nouvelles 2e, Galerie Charpentier, Paris

1940 Publication of Millimeter und Geraden (Millimetres and Straights) Duwaer, Amsterdam

1942 Inaugural Exhibition, Art of this Century Gallery, New York.

1944 Publication of Arp’s volume of poetryRire et Coquille, Amsterdam, designed by Vordemberge-Gildewart.
Publisher Frans Duwaer, Amsterdam was shot by the Gestapo and under one of his successors Vordemberge-Gildewart became the editor of the Editions Duwaer series..
Participated in Konkrete Kunst, Kunsthalle, Basle

1945 First book in Editions Duwaer series is published: Kandinsky, 11 tableaux et 7 poèmes.

1948 3ème Salon Réalités Nouvelles, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Paris.

1949 Publication of Vordemberge-Gildewart, Epoque Neerlandaise, Editions Duwaer, Amsterdam.
Exhibits inLes Premières Maîtres de l’art abstrait, Galerie Maeght, Paris.

1950 Designed window displays for De Bijenkorf, Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam.

1951 De Stijl, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam.

1952 De Stijl , XXVI Venice Biennale
Becomes lecturer at Academie van beeldende Kunsten, Rotterdam to teach on ‘Colour as spaceforming element in architecture’.

1953 Awared prize at the 2nd São Paolo Biennale.

1954 One-man exhibition at Galerie Ferdinand Möller, Cologne.
Appointed director of the Department of Visual Communication at the Hochschule für Gestaltung, Ulm.

1955 Awarded the Justus-Möser Medal by the city of Osnabrück.
Participated in first Documenta, Kassel.

1956 Exhibition Kunsthaus, Zürich, Albers, Glarner, Vordemberge-Gildewart

1955-59 Exhibitions: Museum und Kunstverein, Ulm
Osthausmuseum, Hagen
Landesgewerbeanstalt, Kaiserslauter
Kunstverein, Frankfurt/Main
Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden (parallel with Ackermann, Itten, Kleint)
Die Insel, Hamburg
Kunstverein Freiburg, Breisgau

1957 Participation exhibition Painting Poets - painters making poetry, Kunstmuseum St Gallen

1960 Participation exhibition Concrete Art, 50 years development, Helmhaus, Hanover

1962 Particpated in retrospective The Twenties in Hanover
Died in Ulm

1963 One-man exhibitions: Städtisches Museum, Ulm; Kunstkabinett Klihm, Munich
Group exhibitions: International Avantgarde 1927-9, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam

1964 Group exhibitions: Mondrian, de Stijl and their impact, Marlborough-Gerson Gallery, New York; de Stijl, Museum am Ostwall, Dortmund and 13 Concrete Artists, Kunstverein Ulm

1965 One-man exhibitions: Toninelli Arte Moderna, Milan; Galleria del Levante, Rome

1966 One-man exhibitions: Gemeentemuseum, The Hague; Galerie d’Eendt, Amsterdam; Galerie 58, Rapperswil
Group exhibitions: Tendencies in Structural Art, Westfälischer Kunstverein, Landesmuseum Münster; DADA exhibition, 50th anniversary, Kunsthaus Zürich; Constructuvist Painting 1915-30, Kunstverein Frankfurt

1967 One-man exhibitions: Stedelijk van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven; Kunsthalle, Basle (together with Graeser and Danskin)
Group exhibitions: Spectrum of Colour, from a private collection, Zürich, Kunhaus, Zürich
Collection of Marguerite Arp-Hagenbach, Kunstmuseum, Basle and St. Gallen
DADA exhibition, 50th anniversary, Musée d’Art Moderne, Paris

1968 One-man exhibition: Galerie im Hause Behr, Stuttgart
Group exhibitions: de Stijl, Camden Arts Centre, London
Plus by Minus: Today’s Half-Century, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo
Collagen aus sechs Jahrzenten, Kunstverein, Frankfurt
Acquisitions of the 1930s and 1940s, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Die Geschichte der Collage, Kunstgewerbemuseum Zürich

1969 Parallel Exhibition to the 1969 Nuremberg Biennale, Constructivist Art, Galerie Teufel, Koblenz (together with Buchheister and Fleischmann)
Group exhibition: Kunst unserer Zeit -Sammlung Wolf und Ursula Hermann, Kunstverein Kunsthalle Bremen

1970 One-man exhibitions: Städtische Kunsthalle, Mannheim; Galerie Müller, Cologne; Galerie Fürneisen-Dröscher, Hamburg; Galerie im Erker, St. Gallen, Galerie 58, Rapperswil
Group exhibitions: L’Art en Europe autour de 1925, L’Ancienne Douane, Strasbourg
Sammlung Marguerite Arp-Hagenbach, Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller, Otterlo
The Non-Objective World 1914-24, Annely Juda Fine Art, London

1971 One-man exhibitions: La Boetie, New York; Richard Feigen Gallery, Chicago
Group exhibitions: Beckmann, Vordemberge-Gildewart, Fiedler, Kunsthistorisch Institut, Universitat Amsterdam
Annely Juda Fine Art, London
Galerie Chauvelin, Paris
The Non-Objective World 1924-1939, Galleria Milano, Milan
The Twenties, Galerie Nierendorf, Berlin
Deutsche Avantgarde 1915-35, Galerie Gmurzynska-Bargera, Cologne
Masters of Early Constructivist Abstract Art, Galerie Denise René, New York
Konstruktive Tendenzen