Gerhard Marcks

1889-1981

German artist Gerhard Marcks began work as an apprentice to German sculptor Richard Scheibe at age eighteen. He quickly developed a successful artistic career with a primary focus in sculpture, but also incorporated drawings, woodcuts, lithographs, and ceramics into his body of work. Upon the birth of the Bauhaus movement in 1919, Marcks was one of the first three faculty members appointed, and was given control of the school’s Pottery Workshop. In 1925, the Pottery Workshop was discontinued, and Marcks was soon after named director of the School of Applied Arts in Burg Giebichenstein. He worked there until his dismissal in 1933, when his work was deemed unsuitable by the Nazi regime. In 1943, his studio in Berlin was bombed during an air raid, and many of his pieces were lost. During his career, Marcks was associated with multiple art-related political groups, including the November Group and Workers Council for Art. A decade before his death in 1981, the Gerhard Marcks Haus Museum was established in his honor, and houses a permanent exhibition of his artwork.