Albert Reimann (1874 – 1971) German metalworker and educator

School for Applied Arts

Albert Reimann (1874 – 1971) was a metalworker and educator from Germany. He was a Berlin and London resident.

Biography

Albert and his wife Klara Reimann founded the Schülerwerkstatten für Kleinplastik (School for Small Sculpture) in Berlin in 1902. Reimann was a gifted craftsman who created prototypes to produce bronze, copper, silver, gold, and pottery. The school was divided into 23 departments in 1912, each with its specialist teacher. Each student studied perspective drawing, shadow construction, anatomy, art history and costume design, colour theory, and tailoring. In 1914, the school’s initial enrollment of 14 students grew to 500. From 1912, the Reimann School was affiliated with the Hohere Fachschule für Dekorationskunst (Advanced College of Decorative Arts), an institution established by the Deutscher Werkbund in collaboration with the Deutsche Verband für das kaufmannische Unterrichtswesen (German Association for Commercial Education) and the Verband Berliner Spezialgeschafte to educate window decorators (Berlin Association of Specialty Shops).

School for the Graphic Arts

From 1913, the Reimann School was affiliated with the Kunst- und Kunstgewerbeschule, the state’s only private institution of its kind. Boutique techniques, ivory carving, painting, clothing design, architecture, spatial arts, and set, packaging, and poster design were all covered in the courses. At first, Reimann was the sole instructor. Karl Heubler, who headed the metalworking studio, joined him in 1905. A committee comprised of Hermann Muthesius, Peter Behrens, and Theo Schmuz-Baudiss oversaw instruction. By 1927, there were 30 instructors, including typography and graphic design instructor Max Hertwig and painters Moriz Melzer and Georg Tappert. Hans Baluschek and Paul Scheurich were later added to the staff. Julius Klinger oversaw the poster design department. 

School magazine

The first issue of the school magazine Mitteilungen der Schule Reimann was published in 1916; it was renamed Farbe und Form between 1920 and 1934. Heubler encouraged his students to work independently and in their unique style. Their work was exhibited at the ‘Große Berliner Kunstausstellung’ in 1906 at Berlin’s Kunstgewerbeschule, in the zoological gardens in 1906, in their building in 1908, in the Kunstgewerbe Museum in 1909, and at the 1914’Deutscher Werkbund-Ausstellung,’ where the students decorated a row of shops.

Final exhibition

Their last major exhibition took place in Schénenberg in 1920. The school provided professional training on a par with Vienna’s Kunstgewerbeschule and enrolled up to 1,000 students, many of them from abroad, in the 1920s. Numerous accomplished Bauhaus artists were able to continue their studies at the Reimann School following 1922. Reimann designed tabletop accessories for Chase Copper and Brass in Waterbury, Connecticut, beginning in 1933. These included copper and silver candlesticks and vessels in the Vienna Secession style. Reimann, a Jew, was forced to sell the school to architect Hugo Haring in 1935 when the Nazis enacted the antisemitic Nuremberg Laws. In 1936, Reimann relocated to London and established a new Reimann School. The Berlin school was renamed the Kunst und Werk-Privateschule für Gestaltung in 1936 before being destroyed by bombs in 1943. Unfortunately, Reimann’s London school was also bombed.

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Albert Reimann

Sources

Byars, M., & Riley, T. (2004). The design encyclopedia. Laurence King Publishing. https://amzn.to/3ElmSlL

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