Willibrord Haas
1936 Schramberg
Important artist of the Informal.
Willibrord Haas was born in the Black Forest in 1936 into a family of musicians. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. He has been working as a freelance artist in Berlin since 1961. Shortly afterwards, he made the acquaintance of Joseph Beuys, whose understanding of art was a major inspiration to him. From 1975, he was a lecturer in etching at the International Summer Academy in Salzburg and was regularly involved in events at various institutions. He received a classical academic education and is therefore also well versed in antiquity. Nevertheless, he is an important representative of the informal.
He contributes to this with large-format, colorful paintings that also give space to chance with very fluidly applied paint. His extensive body of prints, which he produces in his own workshop, is a completely separate field of activity. It ranges from abstract, technically sophisticated multi-colored etchings to intimate portraits.
Willibrord Haas loves colors and light, the interplay of which he explores in his paintings and drawings. For the German artist, the results are landscapes of the soul, which he also assembles from set pieces of traditional fairy tales and symbols, but also from themes of modern technology. He has a deep fascination for color, which runs through all areas of his artistic work. For his acrylic glazes, the painter allows the paint diluted with water to flow sensitively over the canvas. An unpredictable interplay unfolds between the richly pigmented primary colors yellow, red and blue, opening up new color spaces that form the soul landscapes desired by the artist in great harmony and joie de vivre. Color is also the focus of the elaborate etchings, which are created with the help of large copper plates. The effort involved is so great that Haas only prints a few copies of a work and only produces further pieces if there is sustained demand. He was particularly unlucky with his etching Polarnacht: the printing plates were lost after the first editions, meaning that subsequent orders could no longer be fulfilled. Since the beginning of his exhibition activities in 1961, Willibrord Haas has participated in over 200 exhibitions at home and abroad.
"Es ist schön, zu ritzen, zu ätzen, die eigenen Hände dem Metall, der Säure, der Druckerschwärze und Farbe auszusetzen, auch wenn man sich dabei dreckig macht. Das Ergebnis, ein poetischer Farbrausch auf blütenweißen Bütten, in frischem Zustand noch feucht, lohnt alle Mühe. Meine Werkstatt ist mehr als eine Produktionsstätte, es kommt da vieles zusammen: Freude an der Farbe, an kniffligen technischen Problemen, die Lust an den ganz besonderen Gerüchen, nasser Filz riecht tatsächlich wie ein Loden nach einer feuchten Wanderung, wie Schafe im Regen, feuchtes Bütten fast wie Hefeteig. Naturasphaltstaub hat einen ganz speziellen, nicht unangenehmen Geruch, dann der unverwechselbare Geruch erhitzter Druckfarbe, der sich mit Maschinenölgeruch der Kupferdruckpresse vermischt, es ist wirklich ein kleiner Kosmos für sich und dabei ein Stück von meinem Leben, von mir selbst geworden, meiner ganz speziellen Art mit meiner Kunst, mit ihrer Entstehung, ihrer Materialwerdung zu leben. Malerei mit anderen Mitteln, mit für mich ganz besonders schönen Mitteln". Willibrord Haas
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Watercolor on wood, framed
Signed & dated
verso - signed, dated & inscribed
Size 81 x 60 cm
Provenance | Gallery Germany, Private Collection Denmark
Differential taxation according to § 25a UStG. No taxes included. | Differenzbesteuerung nach § 25a UStG. Kunstgegenstände und Sammlungsstücke, Sonderregelung.
