Josef Albers

Albers was a student of the Bauhaus in Dessau, Germany and was a practicing artist in the fields of design, typography, photographer, painter, printmaker and poet. His most influential work was created in the field of abstract painting and it showed an influence of both the Bauhaus and the Constructivists with its simplified geometric shapes. However, he also proved to be very influential to many other graphic designers and artists as a teacher at the Black Mountain College in North Carolina from 1933-49 and at Yale University in Connecticut from 1950-58.


His series Homage to the Square is an example of his disciplined approach to composition and color theory. Towards the end of his career he and his wife established the Joseph and Anni Albers foundation in an effort to continue sharing and promoting the theory that he had established during his career. His style and work represent a bridge between the European art of the Bauhaus and Constructivists and the new American Art that emerged in the 1950s and 60s. He was a teacher and an artist his entire career, until his death in 1976 at the age of 88.