Vita T. Lux Feininger - Art Archives (ARTfilo powered)

Vita

1910

Theodore Lucas Feininger, born on June 11 in Berlin-Zehlendorf, the third son of Julia (born Lilienfeld, married Berg, 1880-1970) and Lyonel Charles Adrian Feininger (1871-1956). His siblings are Andreas (1906-1999) and Laurence (1909-1976) and from the first marriage of Lyonel (with Clara Fürst, 1879-1944) the half sisters Eleonore "Lore" (1901-1991) and Marianne (1902-1999).

[Julia Feininger with Andreas, Laurence and Theodore Lux and nurse; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1919

The family relocates to Weimar, where Lyonel Feininger is appointed ‘Meister’ (Master) at the newly established Bauhaus. The beginning of joyless school years in Weimar, the siblings suffer from the small town nationalism and anti-Semitism and the general hostile attitude against the members of the Bauhaus.

These middle-class bourgeois hated the Weimar Republic and its institutions...; people who had never cared a damn for the arts now felt compelled to side with anything that was anti-Bauhaus; from hating the product they arrived easily at hating the producers, and from them to their offspring was but a step. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

[From left to right: Lux, Andreas, Laurence at "Penions Spiess" Braunlage, Harz Mountains, Summer 1918; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1922

Spends the summer with Erich and Sidi Heckel in Osterholz at the Firth of Flensburg. Visit to Hamburg.

His drawing of sailing ships leads him to study the rigging; the documents he gathers throughout his life grow into a considerable collection: At the age of 12, I set myself the task to „learn the ropes“ of a full-rigged ship (from a diagram) and achieved this with ease in two languages. [...] Differences in rig, hull forms, national and local characteristics of water-craft, the history of types, their development, survival and gradual disappearance from the scene, the functions filled by various types, the people that built and manned them - briefly, the life - these factors, underlying the visual appeal of the subjects, were my guides in building the collection. [...] It is a painters’s collections of ship pictures. I am not an historian, and I do not call myself a marine painter in the accepted sense of the term, but I will not deny that my interest in ships is supported by considerable, if theorectical, technical understanding of what I was collecting. (Overall Description of the Collection of Marine Photographs, ODMP)

[Lux in Weimar, around 1922, Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1924

Till spring 1925 he and his brother Laurence attend the “Neue Schule” in Hellerau near Dresden, orientated on progressive education, and directed by the art historian Alois Schardt (1889-1955).
I have know, in Hellerau, moments of such luminous bliss of existence in body and soul as may well be mistaken for previews of the Elysian Fields... [T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript]

The first summer stays with his father in Deep at the Baltic Sea [now: Mrzeżyno, Poland] continued yearly till 1935.
1924 was the first year the Feininger family came to Deep. My father and I went there 14 days early... A larger accomodation was found nearby in the house of master mason A. Wilke; also during the following years the family inhabited the center apartment on the gound floor. In front of the living and dining room was the small porch... Here nearly all of [Lyonel's] drawings and watercolors, which bear dates of the summer months between 1924 and 1935, were executed.* [T. Lux Feininger, Lyonel Feininger und die Landschaft, 1991, see: TEXTS]

[T. Lux, Lyonel and Julia Feininger; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1925

Starts occupying himself with photography.

"In the winter of 1925, in my search for new possibilities, I came across an old [Kodak] box camera that turned out to still be usable. I wanted to photograph my 'small objects'... I still printed my very first negatives in a copy frame in the sunshine, but even before the family left Weimar in summer 1926, I made "gaslight copies" (as the developing papers were then commonly called)... In the spring of 1926 I procured a [more suitable Voigtländer] 9x12cm plate camera. ... Almost everything that was later published was photographed with the new camera; only a few pictures, specially commissioned by the Bauhaus stage workshop, were taken with a borrowed large-format studio camera."* [paraphrased from: TLF, From My Early Days, April 1978]
"Inanimate objects were not my interest in photography. I wanted life, action, faces and figures. The Bauhaus architecture enthralled me, [it] was the stage on which the daily drama of existence was enacted!" [TLF: Two Worlds manuscript]

[His photographs of the years 1925-1936 gain fame because of their distinctive style. In his essay Philip Ursprung states: “Lux Feininger has a more relaxed and playful relation to the camera”, and continues: “In his photographs, the Bauhaus turned from a space of education to a stage for lifestyle [and] … recall the ideal of an autonomous, protected and free community”
[2017, see: TEXTS]. – During the artist’s first years in the USA, until he joined the United States Army, 1936-1942, photographs were mainly taken in New York City. He stays focused on people, but is also fascinated by engines, harbor sceneries, trucks and traffic. – After the Second World War, while continuing this thematic interest, he expands his photographic oeuvre by artistic and technical experiments, 1945-1958; see entry in 1945.]

1926

Move to Dessau.
At the age of sixteen-and-a-half he becomes student of the Bauhaus school in Dessau, starting the winter semester 1926-27 with the preliminary 'Vorkurs' of Josef Albers. As of the 2nd term (summer 1927, till 1929) stage workshop and stage class of Oskar Schlemmer. Postgraduate studies 1929-1932. Other teachers are Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Active member of the Bauhaus Band (Banjo, Clarinet).

In later years the artist summarizes his studies: "Bauhaus Dessau 1926-1929 (Stage Craft). On my own: Photography, Painting, Drawing, Sailing Ship design and rigging. Evolution of Steam Locomotive" [from his CV for the US-Army, 1942].

T. Lux Feininger, Foto: Werner Jackson (Isaacsohn) ca. 1926/27/Scan from 'Bauhaus Fotografie'

1927

Photographic work in the darkroom in the basement of the Feininger's Master House, which his brother Andreas had set up.
Represented by DEPHOT, the Berlin photo agency.
The central office through which my picture reports reached the press was DEPHOT in Berlin (Deutscher Photo-Dienst in Jägerstraße), a creation of W. S. Guttmann, a fanatic of the new photography. ... Through Otto Umbehr (Umbo) a meeting came about. He foresaw a future for me and offered me a contract. ... I worked with DEPHOT from 1928-1931, during which time much more was published than I could compile from memory today. Some of the main clients were Die Funkstunde, Der Rundfunk, Kölnische Illustrierte, Frankfurter Zeitung, Die Woche. As quickly as the fees came in, they were spent; whether I could have lived on them I never put to the test, since I was well provided for at home. After all ... in a letter of June 1928 I find the remark that "for over four hundred Marks mostly new things" had been sold, "some with articles, and always in the best company" [after: TLF, From my early days, April 1978].

In spring 1927, following the pre-course, I joined the stage workshop. Together with Roman Clemens ... I dedicated myself to the design and execution of masks and costumes, but we also played as extras in larger performances...* [T. Lux Feininger, Erinnerungen an Oskar Schlemmer, see: TEXTS]

1928

Member of the Bauhaus band (starts with the banjo, later also the clarinet), till 1932

He is proud to study at the bauhaus but he is obviously showing some scepticism, too. In a survey, printed by the 'bauhaus' journal he ("lux feininger, 4th semester, stage, only enrolled in school before") answers decidely to the question concerning the criticized education methods by bauhaus-opponents: (7) to me, the criticism of the bauhaus-adversaries seems to be invalid to the extent that i concider the leading heads at the bauhaus capable of choosing out of the "proven methodologies". However the criticism is valid, because particularly among the students a sometimes haughty general rejection of the past has found room. This seems particularly dangerous to me.
And when asked for "the contrast between "kunst" [art] in the conventional and "gestaltung" [design] in the new sense?" he answers evasively but nontheless self-confidently: (8) Due to my distinctive position, which maybe does not match the bauhaus, i am not going to comment on that. [bauhaus – zeitschrift für gestaltung 2/3, 1928, 2nd year, p. 24 et seq.]

[T. Lux with Banjo, Andreas photographing; foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1929

Participates at the FiFo. Film und Foto Internationale Ausstellung des Deutschen Werkbunds (The International Film and Foto exhibtion by the German Werkbund). Pobably this year the magazine Die Wochenschau (No. 36) presents Prominent representatives of modern photographic art (Prominent Vertreter moderner Lichtbildkunst): Nikola Perscheid, Albert Renger-Patzsch, Moholy-Nagy, Hugo Erfurth, Franz Fiedler, Walter Hege, Lux Feininger.
"When I studied in the preliminary course of 1926, any kind of photographic instruction was unknown. The few photographing students were extremely reticent. ... Probably the only photographer with whom I had frequent discussions was Peterhans [Walter P., was master at the Bauhaus 1929-1933], who responded to my work with friendly collegial respect. I owe him many valuable tips. ... Although my acquaintance with him came too late, ... I nevertheless believe that his great seriousness and respect for good craftsmanship influenced me noticeably in a general pictorial way." [paraphrased from: TLF, From My Early Days, April 1978]

Bauhaus degree. This summer he turns to painting, following a suggestion by his fellow student and friend, Clemens Röseler.
Post-graduate studies at the Bauhaus, till 1932.

I began painting on my own in 1929. There was at first apparently a total opposition to almost the entire Bauhaus School of painting. Only gradually elements of the Bauhaus teachings rose to levels of consciousness in my understanding. Supporters and encouragers in the first early phase were Oskar Schlemmer („im Uebrigen hinsichtlich Figur – alle Achtung!“), Lyonel Feininger and Clemens Röseler, my friend and very promising Kandinsky pupil, who died at the early age of twenty-eight, in 1934. [CV 1955]

[T. Lux Feininger & Hermann Clemens Roeseler, foto: Lore Feininger, Feininger Estate]

1930

Together with his friend Clemens Röseler, the now young painter sets up his own studio in the spartan rooms of an old brickworks.
I had chosen to adopt the “nom-de-guerre” with my father’s encouragement, but against my mother’s opposition… The idea of signing with an unknown name came from Röseler. [T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript]

End of November represented with two paintings in the „Kunstblatt-Exhibition“ Künstler im Reich [Artists in the Reich], Reckendorfhaus, Berlin, under the name of Theodore Lux.
Remarkable is the [spacial setup] seen in the in peculiar paintings by Theodor Lux. This 20 year old from Dessau – he is born 1910, surprises with the awareness of surface tectonics. The shading of the colors, the unconventional silhouette of the figures, the spirited game of the straights and angles by the sailboats is completely determined by the rhythm of the surfaces. The "Einfahrt von Havanna" [1930] may remind one of popular English colorprints, with the "Piratenschiff" [Piraten, 1930] the coloring may still be a little too loud and too boisterous; but there is no mistaking that these compositions come from a young man, who has painterly composition skills in his blood and who seems mannered to develop his own species.* [Paul Westheim, Das Kunstblatt, December 1930, p. 358-369]

Although American born he needs to confirm citizenship of the United States of America, on the 18th of November.

Studio Dessau 1930, Foto: Lyonel Feininger

1931

Exhibition of some paintings at the Bauhaus in Dessau.
At the Bauhaus, the same tendencies that had caused Schlemmer’s leaving the scene... rejected my paintings as “socially meaningless”. I fared better in the outside world... (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

Acquisition of photographs by Philipp Johnson for the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Summer trip to Switzerland; followed by Brittany.

Leaves home and moves together with Clemens Röseler in a studio community in the “Ziegelei”, the residence of a shut down brick factory.

The last couple of days Lux made very free, very good color drawings. He is in a new stage of inner growth. (Lyonel Feininger to Julia, Deep 17.9.1931)

[Ernst Egeler, right & Lux Feininger, left, in Fontana Martina, Ronco, Lago Maggiore, June 1931; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1931/32

Solo exhibition in Kunstverein Erfurt, accompanied by considerable interest and some sales.

1932

Visits his brother Andreas in Hamburg. One-month stay in Paris. First invitation to exhibit at the Carnegie International Exhibition in Pittsburgh. Participation in the exhibitions in the years 1933 - 1937, 1943 and 1946 - 1948.

Lux is starting, undergoing a noticeable, important new-orientation in his painterly work, now that he is working with the right paper, in a bigger format, and with charcoal outline. Initially he had a hard time, to accept – but after only a few attempts, almost inevitably, he came to an advanced visual view and to a bigger image perception, that gives a lot to expect. (Lyonel Feininger an Julia, Deep 9.6.1932)

In the fall (with parental blessing and small monthly allowance [204]), move to Paris, where he lives until 1935; initially in the small studio of his godfather, the sculptor Theodore Spicer-Simson (1871-1959) in Rue Campagne Première, Montparnasse. Unexpectedly, his mother had decreed that Andreas had to accompany him, and it took until early 1933 before the brothers had gotten together: Both of us must have been under greater pressure than we realized. In the background of our own individual affairs there was the grim cloud overhanging the East, ready to burst at any moment, which it did on January 30, 1933, of unhallowed memory. But, much as it had been on my mind for more than a year, Andreas seemed unaffected by it; I cannot recall our discussing it [226].

Up to 1935 annual trips to Germany and Sweden.

[Lyonel und Lux; Foto: Julia Feiningr, verso: "gosh! that was a good one!", T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1933

Participation in the International exhibition of the College Art Association in New York and Cleveland.

[Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1934

In Paris he just had moved into the beautiful, shining, new apartment in the new building situated at No. 93, avenue des Moulineaux, in the town of Boulogne-sur-Seine, au cinquième, when the news of the death of his fellow student and friend Hermann Clemens Roeseler arrived. He decides to support Edith, Clemens' widow, and travels to Coblenz. Given these impressions, back in Paris, he paints "Burial at Sea". And: Fourty-four years later, I painted my picture of the wedding, "The Marriage at Coblentz". (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

We've enjoyed beautiful weeks with the boys; first came Lux, in May. My, did he look skinny! but whatever did happen to him? A young god in bronze! (Lyonel Feininger to Ilse Garbe [see photo], 28.7.1934)
And soon Lux will come too, and it will almost be like before. The good, he is fed up with Paris, but his writings about his last work sound very encouraging. (Lyonel Feininger to Julia, Kuhtz 13.10.1934)

[Photo: T. Lux in Deep 1934, Foto: Lyonel Feininger]

1935

January returns from Paris to Berlin. Sale of one of the paintings shown at the International Carnegie Exhibition, Pittsburgh.

Emotionally I was ready to leave Paris; I was not tempted by sudden wealth to have another shy at staying. … My parents had settled in Berlin-Siemensstadt after their peregrinations of 1933-34 and were counting on my arrival. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)
Back in Berlin, he painted his first picture, "Brig 'Maria'", in Moritz and Eva Noack's apartment in Jungfernheideweg, which he shared with Werner ("Jackson") Isaccson. He first met Jackson, a Bauhaus student, in Weimar in 1926, when the latter visited his parents to discuss the color scheme for the interior of the Meisterhaus No. 1, which they were soon to move into, on behalf of the Bauhaus in Dessau, Department of Mural Painting. [205]

Solo exhibitions in the Gallery Karl Nierendorf, Berlin and the Gallery Commeter, Hamburg. Stay in Hamburg, sketches in the harbor and at the Elbe river.

Theodor Lux, an artist, represented by the Gallery Nierendorf, does not make the impression of a beginner, with an abundance of moderately large paintings from his fantastic-romantic world, again and again dominated by the rigging and the sails of ships. (Anonymous, in: Die Weltkunst, 3.2.1935)

Lux had just sold 3 pictures in Hamburg – small ones – for a very reduced price. He’s happy and it means enough for him to get over the summer, all in all. No criticisms as yet, and – a very hard knock for the boy. The Kulturk. [Reichskulturkammer] has written, demanding to receive proof that Lux is “arisch” - … the matter can rest for a few days – Lux has time until the 25th of the month for his answer, you may be able to help with advice. (Lyonel Feininger to Julia, Berlin 1.4.1935)

Was in town to see Lux’ pictures at Nierendorf’s and to speek with Karl N. about the affairs of the K.K. [Reichskulturkammer]. (Lyonel Feininger to Julia, Berlin 3.4.1935)

Yesterday was exceptionally warm and the sun was also out, and I was out walking for almost 3 hours - while Lux went out sailing in the morning in extremely choppy weather, he sat upstairs the whole of the afternoon at his easel. He creates. He creates enormously – basically with a frugality that such trouble-free creating makes possible – in the time he needs to finish a complete harmoniously executed painting, I would possibly, in effort and passion – serving the upheaval and final order - achieve the tenfold of labour and still not come to some result. Again and again I admire the logical simplicity of his creating, technical and representational – whilst I am chained to other premises that make battlefields out of my canvases […] Lux got notice from the K.K.-Affairs, to exhibit in Germany in the 3rd Reich foreigners do not need to belong the Kammer, the art exhibition organiser needs a permit for the exhibition. Consequently the whole sordid, painful question is taken from Lux and the boy is extremely relieved in his mind. (Lyonel Feininger to Julia, Deep 11.3.1935)

Stays in his parents' apartment in Berlin-Siemensstadt, 21 Lenthersteig, he paints in his father's studio; T. Lux Feininger reports on two paintings he completes here.
From May 31st untill July 8, 1935, Trip to Sweden. [201]

My exhibition [...] had come to Hamburg and [during my stay there] would have been on view at Cometer; but I did not go, which had to do with both my psychology and the times in which we lived. While I traveled with the proceeds from that exhibition to soak up remnants of the passing, beautiful Germany, my move to America was already a decided decision that would become a reality in the course of the next year. The heavy clouds were gathering ever more densely over Europe.* (T.Lux Feininger, Andenken an 1935. Text on the occasion of his exhibition in Hamburg-Altona, 27.9.1998)

[Foto: Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin]

1936

Solo exhibition in the Gallery Karl Nierendorf, Berlin, good reviews and sales.

These are the hallmarks of success, but how ephemeral it was, is shown by a remark made to [Karl] Nierendorf’s brother Joseph … by a nazi-approved art critic, who tipped him a wink to stop showing “this Theodore Lux” if he wanted to remain unmolested. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

During his last summer in Germany, he lives in his parents' apartment in Berlin-Siemensstadt, 21 Lenthersteig; he paints in his father's studio and completes at least five paintings.

November relocates from Bremerhaven to the United States of America. Farewell to his parents at the Lehrter Bahnhof railway station, Berlin, on November 5, 1936. Arrival in New York on 16th November 1936. His first studio apartment is located in 511 East 85th Street in the Yorkville district.

I did not leave for the United States until November 1936. I cannot remember what kept me another year in the doomed country. So far as physical comforts went, it was pleasant enough. But my mind was made up…: My persuasion, that the Nazis meant to start another war, was generally ridiculed. … But I remained unshakeable: the constellation of Reichswehr, brownshirts and forced labor, which I had seen beginning their work last summer, told too plain a tale in my eyes. All I wanted was, to be in a place where I could come in on the right side, when it began as I knew it must. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

It had been my own, private and personal leave-taking, not from family and dear ones but from the native earth, air, speech and youth all at one. The sentiment that brought tears was a reminder that recognition of my part in this ghastly drama of nazification was overdue.
I must also say a word about my [65 year old] father’s failure to recognize his own position in regard to the Hitler threat. His wishful “certainty” that “all this” would blow over is the most serious fault I have to find with his judgement. … – When we parted company it was left open when and where we would meet again. I believe that it was only by March next year, that my father got the idea that almost anywhere was better than where he was, and as to time, it would be, the sooner the better. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

[Lux and Julia Feininger; verso: The Meeting in Hamburg, August 1936. M[a]. & P[a]. return from U.S.A. [Mills Coll. 1st Summer], Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1937

January solo exhibition at the Gallery Commeter, Hamburg

Theodor Lux, son of Feininger, exhibits the second time at Commeter. His marine paintings with their seafarer romance seem very well suited for the ‘Menschen der Waterkante’ [humans from the Watergate; citizens of Hamburg]. Sailers with full rigging, girls and sailors, sea and clouds, they are the ever recurring theme of these paintings. This painting, with the strong coloring, the clear plastic composition, the clean and presice accuracy in the treatment of all things makes the Biedermeier period come alive. (Karla Eckert, in: Hamburger Tageblatt, 13.1.1937)

The acclaim that the strange, decorative paintings by the son of Feininger, Theodor Lux, found last year, prompted Commeter to exhibit new works by this peculiar artist. Paintings with an ecstatic-romantic coloring, which combine precision and the fantastic in a curious however convincing melange. (Ernst Sander, in: Hamburger Fremdenblatt, 8.1.1937)

In New York the camera is his constant companion. He finds motives on the piers and in the streets of Manhattan - people, trucks, steamships and locomotives; some of those images are quoted in his drawings and some are condensed in paintings.
Impressed by the new city his initial view is a more documentary approach, but by 1939 his vantage point broadens again and his compositions gain creativity. This artistic creation process stops when the USA enters the war in 1941.

[T. Lux Feininger in apt. 511, E. 85 St. N.Y.C., Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1938

In Boston, he is introduced to Eric Schroeder, who later becomes a good friend and committed supporter of his art. They met in the context of his small exhibition of about a dozen paintings at the Hotel Somerset in Boston, organized by the Architectural Club of the School of Architecture at Harvard, to whose dean Walter Gropius had just been appointed. [205]

1939

After five years, in April happy reunion with his brother Laurence in New York City, but despite good and again confidential talks he insists of going back to Rome and left New York for Genoa in July. Less than a month later, Hitler had invaded Poland.

The coming of war could be forefelt by many signs of queer behaviour on the part of people, who, previously, had seemed rational and balanced. – As might be expected, my dreams were not idle either. ... (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

His intensive work of the past months is rewarded by the sale of some paintings to private collectors.

I had amassed a pretty nest-egg through several picture sales and signed a year’s lease for the 3rd floor apartment at 118 Perry St., without undue worries. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

"We hope soon to have Lux here on a visit. For the present, he is hard at work, painting, in his little apartment on 85th Str. … He has been having much encouragement lately, and has been selling some paintings for very good prices. Critics are now getting alive to the fact that he is a decidedly original young American artist…" (Letter from Lyonel Feininger, Falls Village, CT, am 8. August 1939, addressee unknown)

1940

He moves into his new studio apartment at 118 Perry Street in New York's West Village at the beginning of 1940.

Exhibtion together with Ben Shahn in the Julian Levy Gallery, New York.

At the turn of the year 1940/41 he stays with Eric Schroder in Cambridge, MA; he paints "Sidewheeler 'Fredonia' in a Rough Sea" and his first railroad painting, the locomotive "Brutus".

1941

In January, move to the nearby spacious apartment at 129 Perry Street in the West Village.

He is profoundly shocked by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, 7th December (followed by the entry of the USA into the war and his draft for the army). And in later years this dramatic break leads him to devide his artistic oeuvre in "before Pearl Harbor" and "after Pearl Harbor".

In the summer he stays in his parents' apartment in New York, 235 East 22nd Street, where he paints in his father's studio; T. Lux Feininger reports that he completes two paintings here.
Im Dezember Aufenthalt bei Eric Schroeder in Cambridge, MA; im Auftrag des Schiffseigners, Donald Starr, malt er dessen Yacht "Milky Way".

1942

Drafted in April; up to 1945 duty in the United States Army. Serving as TSgt with the Military Intelligence Division, War Department, during the period 19 Oct 1943 to 2 Sep 1945.
Military Intelligence makes use of his capabilities; 'Sgt. T. Feininger' draws images of enemy weapon systems and military positions which, collected in a restricted registry, are used by the troups for identifcation.

In his CV for the US-Army in 1942 he writes: "I wish to emphasize that I am a good American, actually the best kind: the kind that came here because he wanted to. In my family, this has happened before; in the case of my great-grandfather who, in 1848, decided he preferred America to Prussia. My grandfather fought for his county in the Confederate Army; but, after the war, married the daughter of a Union Captain. My own father was born in New York City. – There is much in this history that I like to think of as being continued in my own person. ... My favorite dislikes, in the order named are: Regimentation, Standing In Line For Things, and Noise I am Not Making Myself."

[Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1943

Participates in the exhibition American Realists and Magic Realists in the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

I paint ships and railroads because they seem beautiful to me, because they make good pictures and because I have dreamt about them. Why I have the dreams, I am unable to say. But in my eyes it makes a good reason for painting as I do. I am not committed to excluding other subjects in any future career I may be fortunate enough to have, after the war. [CV for the US-Army, 1942]

1944

November 11, marriage with Jeanne Sinon (Paterson, NJ 1914 – 1949 New York, NY).

[Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1945

After the war he resumes painting, now in the apartment at 105 East 24th Street, in the Flatiron District near Madison Square Park, where he lives with his wife Jeanne.

In the mid 1940s resumption of his artistic photography. New experimental tele-photos emerge, using binoculars, an opera glass (see photos upper left, and middle right) and a German army officer's field glass (below). "The photo was taken through a Zeiss Prismen binocular, held in front of the lens of a Pilot Reflex Camera. This procedure was an invention by me" [TLF verso on the photo: Watertower...]. For a period of about five years he finds his themes in the streets of Manhattan, at piers, railway stations, the East river... Andreas Feininger mentions this work in his reference book Advanced Photography - Methods and Conclusions, New York 1952, p. 74 ff.

[T. Lux Feininger, photograhic experiments, Fotos left: Andreas, right: T. Lux Feininger, 1952, T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1946

Enrollment under the „G.I-Bill“ at the Institute of Fine Arts, N.Y.U., under Professors Salmony, Lopez-Rey, Friedlander und Cook (1946/1947).

In the summer he stays in his parents' apartment in New York, 235 East 22nd Street, where he paints in his father's studio; T. Lux Feininger reports that he completes seven paintings here.

[Lyonel, Andreas, Laurence und Jeanne; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1947

February solo exhibition in the Julian Levy Gallery, New York, there for he first time under the name of T. Lux Feininger.

In the summer he stays in his parents' apartment in New York, 235 East 22nd Street, where he paints in his father's studio; T. Lux Feininger reports that he completes two paintings here.

[Foto: ART News 1947, ...his public début under his own name; previously he exhbited as Theodore Lux ...]

1949

On May 16, Jeanne dies of stomach cancer in New York City, after a long illness diagnosed in 1947.

[Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1950

Design teacher at the Sarah-Lawrence College, Bronxville, NY, till 1952

"My geometrical researches came to me through having to devise and teach a Design Course at Sarah Lawrence College (1950 – 1952). Although this geometrical phase represents a very „personal experience“, I own kinship to Paul Klee and Josef Albers, their visual tutorship no less than their pedagogic investigations playing their respective parts in influencing me." [1955]

Commencent 1952 at Sarah Lawrence: Kurt Roesch and Lux F. [Foto: Lyonel Feininger, T. Lux Feininger Estate]

Participates in the exhibition Revolution and Tradition in Modern American Art in the Brooklyn Museum, New York.

1952

The painter refers to his last years in New York, from 1946 until 1953 as "My Second Period". He creates paintings based on his New York photographs, often accompanied by drawings. He writes: „These paintings reperesent a kind of peak in the period“: University Place, 14th St. Store, 14th Street Fashions, Jaywalkers, Klein‘s on the Square, Nassau Street Store, New York Cab, Girl and Taxi, Wind and Rain with Cab and Traffic Light, The Fruit Drink Stand, aber auch Hoboken Ferry Terminal oder East River Dock [225].

1953

Moves to Cambridge, MA, finds his first apartment at 888 Massachusetts Avenue.
Teacher for Painting and Drawing at the Harvard University (1953-1962).

1954

Exhibition Four Painters in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, MA. Participates in the exhibition Reality and Fantasy in the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN.

December 17, marriage with Patricia (Pat) Jean Randall (Springfield, MA 9-1-1925 - 11-14-1999 Cambridge, MA).

[Foto: Lyonel Feininger, T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1956

On January 13, his father, Lyonel, passes away. Lux's gallery talk, planned for the opening of the exhibition Feininger Family at the Mint Museum, Charlotte, NC, was cancelled; we took train to New York instead. At the funeral on the 15th of January, the whole family was present" (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

Relocates to 70 Dana Street, Cambridge, MA.

1957

Participates in the exhibition Bauhaus-Maler at the Biennal in Sao Paolo, Brasil.
Birth of his son Lucas.

Moves to 6 Bennet Street in Cambridge, MA.

1959

Birth of his son Conrad.

Moves to 6 Holly Avenue in Cambridge, MA.

1962

Change from Harvard University to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts School as Teacher for Drawing and Painting (1962-1975, retirement).
Retrospective in the Busch-Reisinger Museum, Cambridge, MA.

1963

Buys and moves into the house at Arlington Street, Cambridge, during the Cuban Missile crisis, then maturing to its climax. ... The chief advantages, of course, to buying in this area was the quality of the neighbourhood in Pat’s eyes and therefore also in mine, because I trusted her judgement implicitly where the welfare of our children was involved. (T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript)

[Arlington Street 22, Foto: SC 2011]

1965

Birth of his son Charles.
Publishes with his brother Andreas, who made the photos, the book Lyonel Feininger. Die Stadt am Ende der Welt [City at the Edge of the World].

1967

For Wysse und Andreas Feininger the T. Lux Feininger Retrospective Exhibition of the Trinity College at the Austin Arts Center in Hartford, CT, is the occasion for a visit on 22 Oktober; they spend several days together.
[Photo: Estate of T.Lux Feininger; f. l. t. r.: Lux, Conrad, Andreas, Lucas, Pat, Wysse]

1970

Buys a historical house with workshop from a cooper, located near the fishing port in Westport Point, MA, where he and his family spend the summers.
On August 7, his mother, Julia, dies in Syosset, New York City.

1974

Brief stay in Germany due to unresolved details of ownership regarding the works by his father.
The trip from Berlin to Halle in 1974 ended a thirty-eight year absence on my part, not only from Germany, but also from Europe. ... My own twelve paintings and a box full of negatives of my Bauhaus photographs ... [have] disappeared since then. - The color impressions of this trip ... consist of the green of the farmland, of [the] black-white-red of a magnificent stork in it, as well as of the gray of a rye bread for breakfast, which reminded me of my childhood.* [Quote from the letter of 9.12.2005 to P. Gentz-Werner]

[Lux, Lore and Laurence Feininger in Berlin, photo Galerie Nierendorf, Berlin]

1975

Retires from teaching.

[T. Lux in Westport; Foto: Conrad Feininger]

1977

This winter and spring were very good for my work, and I have noted that the old superstition of a seven-year cycle seems to apply my paintin, since my outstanding years for the past 21 were 1977, 1970, 1963. ... But more than before I experience that these waves of real inspiration are not a guarantee of unlimited production. It is like a favorable breeze when sailing. One must make use of it while it lasts; one knows that it will not blow always. All told, I have, since the summer ended last year, some six to eight really outstanding pictures, and two or three others of respectable quality. [Quote from a letter of May 1977]

1980

Start of the compilation, documentation and archiving of his photographic Oeuvre, encouraged by the New York based galerist Eugene Prakapas For this exhibition the artist selects 202 early photographies, all listed on the "Bauhaus-related photographies".

First large photography exhibition T. LUX FEININGER. Photographs of the Twenties and Thirties, at Prakapas Gallery, New York (1.11.-13.12.1980), the exhibition is very well received.

[Studio Arlington Street 22; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1983

Second large exhibition of his photographic Oeuvre at Prakapas Gallery, New York (17.6.-15.7.1983); c. 100 photographs of the 1930s and 40s are shown.

Brief stay in Germany due to legally unresolved details of ownership regarding the works by his father as well as twelve paintings by himself.

1988

Second exhibition in 'Gallery on the Green' in Lexington, MA

[T. Lux Feininger; Foto: T. Lux Feininger Estate]

1995

Exhibition of paintings from the years 1954 till 1994 in the Gallery Achim Moeller Fine Art, New York.

[T. Lux and Pat in New York; Foto: Conrad Feininger]

1998

Retrospective of the paintings in the Staatlichen Galerie Moritzburg in Halle/Saale afterwards in the Altonaer Museum in Hamburg.

1999

On November 14 Particia (Pat) dies at the age of 74 in Cambridge, MA.

2001

Exhibition of paintings and drawings together with works by his father Lyonel and photographies by his brother Andreas in the Städtischen Galerie Karlsruhe.

2006

The autobiography „Zwei Welten. Mein Künstlerleben zwischen Bauhaus und Amerika“ is published in German language - added is a comprehensive essay by Wolfgang Büche, "T. Lux Feininger - Ein Leben in Bildern".

War and peace, marriage and death, becoming a teacher, marriage again and being the father of three children, but “the early work” knows nothing about all this. It is free from earthly trammels. The impact [of my paintings] on the public has been spectacular. I am impressed and moved by their unsophisticated purity, luminous without a visible light source. ... Gone is the conceit and I now see the beauty of Creation: Youthful unconsciousness that could not last... [T. Lux Feininger, My Life and Paintings, A Memoir, quote from manuscript]

2010/11

Anniversary exhibitons, „Welten-Segler T. Lux Feininger zum 100. Geburtstag Werke 1929-1942“, in the Kunsthalle zu Kiel, the Städtischen Galerie am Abdinghof Paderborn, ther Lyonel Feininger-Galerie Quedlinburg and in the galleries of the Stiftung Ahlers Pro Arte/Kestner Pro Arte in Hanover.

2011

Dies in Cambridge on the 7th of July.
Memorial at the Harvard Art Museums/Busch-Reisinger Museum, Cambridge, October 23.

2019

The jubilee of the founding of the Bauhaus school a 100 years ago prompts a great number of celebrations all over the world. Numerous photographies taken by T. Lux Feininger, during his time as a student at the Bauhaus Dessau, are displayed in various exhibitions and are widely reproduced in catalogues, films, essays and articles online and in print. Prof. Dr. Philip Ursprung, ETH Zurich: The photographs that Theodore Lux Feininger took as a teenager capture the Bauhaus way of life, even more than the formalist studies by the masters, Lázlò Moholy-Nagy und Lucia Moholy, Marianne Brandt, Josef Albers, Herbert Bayer und Lyonel Feininger. They do not focus on the iconic building in Dessau, but depict, from a student's perspective, everyday student life - at work, playing soccer, making music, sunbathing. They testify to the spirit of the acedemic community and the pleasure they found in learning. They also show that the students lived every moment to the fullest without seeming to waste their creativity.
The community already seemed to sense the pressures of constant performance, which was to shape immaterial labour and the "creative industry" from the end of the 20th century onwards. Life as such, the pictures tell us, has become the object of art - a raw materiel ready to be designed, but also to be marketed and consumed. We can learn even more from the students of the Bauhaus than we can from its masters. [P. Ursprung, Designing Life: The Relevance of the Bauhaus. DETAIL 5.2019, p. 6]

[Photographies by T. Lux Feininger at the Bauhaus Dessau]

T. LuxFeininger

Vita

T. Lux
Feininger