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Showing posts from November 5, 2017

Jean Leppien (1910-1991) German/French Geometric Artist

Jean Leppien is relativity unknown in the United States, yet in France and Germany he is known and admired for his artistic achievements.  The Musee d'Art et d'Histoire in Cholet, France, is just wrapping up a major show of his work (11/2017).   If Leppien's life was made into a movie, it would be a thriller, with a remarkable ending.  He was born in 1910 with a given name so long only a German family could come up with it:  Kurt Gottfried Johannes Leppien.  He was conceived and raised in Luneberg, Germany, where his father was a manufacturer and his mother a weaver.  Before his death in 1991, his home town named a street in his honor.   He took to art early, and his father set up a studio on the main floor of their home to let Leppien practice his artwork.  The Bauhaus movement was beginning in Europe around 1919.  In 1929, Leppien road his bike quite a distance to register for school at the Bauhaus - Dessau.  He did not stay at the Bauhaus for long, but got to study u