Artists

Martin Bloch

(1883 Neisse, Germany – 1954 London, England) Immigrated to England 1934

Martin Bloch was born into an assimilated Jewish family in Neisse, Silesia (now Nysa, Poland) in 1883. He initially trained as an architect, later studied drawing in Berlin, and held his first solo exhibition at art dealer Paul Cassirer’s Gallery in Berlin in 1911. Between 1914 and 1920, he lived in Paris and Spain, then returned to Berlin, where he co-founded a painting school with Anton Kerschbaumer in 1926; after the latter’s death in 1931, he was assisted by ‘Die Brucke’ artist Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. In 1933, to escape Nazi persecution, Bloch fled to England, via Denmark, opening the School for Contemporary Painting in London with Australian painter, Roy de Maistre in 1934. There, his students included young refugee cousins, Harry Weinberger and Heinz Koppel, whose freedom of expression and love of colour he helped to develop. Bloch participated in the Exhibition of German-Jewish Artists’ Work at the Parsons Gallery (1934) and in the Exhibition of Twentieth-Century German Art at the New Burlington Galleries (1938) – the latter intended as a riposte to the notorious Nazi Entartete Kunst (‘Degenerate Art’) exhibition (1937); he held his first solo London show at the Lefevre Gallery in 1939.

Following the introduction of internment, Bloch was interned, first at Huyton Camp, Liverpool, then briefly on the Isle of Man. Afterwards, he exhibited in Oxford and Cambridge in 1941. In 1948 he became a guest teacher in Minneapolis and exhibited in both Minneapolis and Princeton, New Jersey, before resuming his influential teaching career in England. His fluid style of painting and spontaneous use of colour inspired his students at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts (1949-54). He exhibited regularly including with Ben Uri Gallery, where he held a joint exhibition with Polish émigré Josef Herman in 1949.

Martin Bloch died in London, England in 1954. His work is held in numerous UK public collections including the Ben Uri Collection and Tate.

Self-portrait, 1926

Oil on canvas

64 x 54 cm

Private Collection

© The Estate of Martin Bloch

Martin Bloch, Self-portrait, 1926

Bloch’s Self-portrait, painted in 1926, the year that he co-founded a Berlin painting school with Anton Kerschbaumer, projects a quiet self-confidence. The work combines the instinctive, emotional approach of German Expressionism with a Fauvist love of colour, apparent in the ochre-yellow background.

Svendborg Harbour, Denmark, 1934

Oil on canvas

68 x 79 cm

Ben Uri Collection

© The Estate of Martin Bloch

Martin Bloch, Svendborg Harbour, Denmark, 1934

In 1934, eight years after his Self-portrait, Bloch was forced to flee Nazi Germany and made his way to England via Denmark, after accepting an invitation from the Danish novelist Karin Michaelis, who helped many émigrés including Bertolt Brecht. Svendborg Harbour, Denmark, a claustrophobic depiction of boats in a crowded harbour, is a classic symbol of exile. Despite the traumatic experience of flight, it is full of energy and colour as the forms are pared down into simple shapes and emotion is conveyed through the use of heightened purples, greens, and mustard yellows. The compression of the perspective into a single, suffocating plane jams the boats against the harbour and creates a distinct uneasiness. Later the same year, Bloch opened a second painting school in London with the Australian painter Roy de Maistre. There, and later at Camberwell School of Art, Bloch encouraged his students to paint with spontaneity and rhythm, beginning by establishing the painting’s dominant and then ancillary colour palettes, then juxtaposing warm and cool tones.

103.5 x 129.5 cm

Private Collection

Martin Bloch, Draperies, 1939

Draperies both demonstrates the enduring legacy of German Expressionism and is also Bloch’s only work to engage with his Jewish heritage. It was included, together with Svendborg Harbour, in his first solo exhibition in London at the Lefevre Gallery in 1939. Interviewed at the exhibition opening in February 1939, Bloch is quoted as saying that he saw the five yards of remaindered Manchester cotton in a shop in Kensington High Street and bought them on impulse. This complex study of overlapping textiles includes a six-pointed Star of David motif, set against a yellow background, both at the centre of, and partly concealed within the overall design, although the centrality of this symbol predates the Nazi decrees which enforced compulsory wearing of the star by those of Jewish origin. The painting highlights the freedom of artistic expression that Bloch found in exile and helped to instil in the next generation of both British-born and younger refugee artists.