Johan Thorn Prikker

Johan Thorn Prikker.
Art by all means – from Art Nouveau to Abstraction
In cooporation with the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam
26 March–7 August 2011

Curators: Christiane Heiser and Barbara Til

Ehrenhof 4-5
40479 Düsseldorf, Germany
T 0049/211/8990200
F 0049/211/8929307
info [​at​] smkp.de
www.museumkunstpalast.de

Working together with the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam, over 130 works are presented by Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf, from the multi-faceted oeuvre of Johan Thorn Prikker (The Hague 1868 to 1932 Cologne). The exhibition of this Dutch artist, who mainly became famous through his Art Nouveau works, is the first retrospective of his oeuvre in over 30 years, comprising all the genres in which this versatile artist was active: paintings, drawings, watercolours, mosaics, murals, glass windows, furniture, design objects, textile art, book covers and carpets.

As well as numerous items from international collections, visitors to Museum Kunstpalast in Düsseldorf will find that the foyer of the collection wing also has a large format window by Thorn Prikker which has been part of the building since 1925. In the same year Thorn Prikker also created two monumental mosaic walls for the corner pavilions of the Ehrenhof.

Johan Thorn Prikker studied painting at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, and even his early paintings and drawing are counted among the most outstanding works of Dutch Symbolism. However, Thorn Prikker gained considerably more fame with his works in applied art, ranging from lead glass through furniture, textile art and carpets to monumental mosaics and murals.

In 1904, after his first successes as an artist, he left the Netherlands to teach at the School of Applied Art and Craft, in Krefeld. Following an invitation by Karl Ernst Osthaus, he then moved to Hagen, where he also designed a monumental window for the town’s central railway station, with the programmatic title: “The Artist as a Teacher for Trade and Commerce”.

It was not only through his wide-ranging artistic work in the Netherlands and Germany that Thorn Prikker made an immense impact on monumental art in Germany, but especially also through his murals, mosaics and windows and also through his teaching activities at various schools of applied art and craft in Krefeld, Munich, Essen, Düsseldorf and Cologne.

The curators of the Düsseldorf exhibition are the art historian Christiane Heiser, who is also an expert on Thorn Prikker, and Barbara Til, head of the Collection Department for Sculptures and Applied Art at Museum Kunstpalast.

Sponsor:
Ministerium für Familie, Kinder, Jugend, Kultur und Sport des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen

Further information on www.smkp.de/prikker

Press Contact: Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf
Marina Schuster / Christina Bolius
T 0049 211 8996211 / T 0049 211 8996250
F 0049/211/8929307
Marina.Schuster@smkp.de / Christina.Bolius@smkp.de