Oscar Bluemner identified with the modern art concepts of the early 1900’s. He met many of the artists in Europe that followed the principles of Chevreul and Rood, nineteenth century color theorists. This influence helped Bluemner formulize his own color concepts. He realized a need to
reduce forms to simplicity. He was an extremely prolific artist who kept elaborate painting diaries and sketchbooks recording his artistic investigations. Through these primary sources, one can trace Bloomer’s exploration of the many facets of nature as he experimented with color theory, perspective and different ways of interpreting the world around him.
The son and grandsons of architects, Bluemner was born in Hanover, Germany in 1867, and was encouraged to follow in the trade. His first one-man show or portraits was held in the Berlin Latin School in 1886. In 1892 he won a medal at the Royal Academy of Design in Berlin where he studied painting and architecture, dissatisfied with the restrictive aesthetic policies of Emperor Wilhelm II’s government, Bluemner left for America that same year.
Bluemner arrived in New York and found a lackluster future in architecture. After suing his partner over the theft of his architecture drawings, Bluemner decided to paint in earnest. Bluemner met Alfred Stieglitz in 1910 and eventually became part of the exclusive “291” circle that included Georgia O’Keefe and Arthur Dove. He participated in the famous Armory show of 1913 and got his first solo show in 1915 at Stieglitz’s gallery.
He continued to show at prestigious galleries but due to his paranoid personality and the Depression, Bluemner did not sell many paintings and lived in reduced circumstances. He took his own life in 1938.
Oscar Bluemner is hailed as a visionary artist who became the cornerstone of the early American Modernist movement. His works are in the collections of major private and public institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Corcoran Gallery in Washington,D.C.; and the Amon Carter Museum of Western Art, Texas.