HENRI PFEIFFER (German 1907-1952)

Henri Pfeiffer (German, 1907-1952) was one among a few modern artists who truly embodied the idea of a Renaissance man. He studied music, architecture, science, theatre, medicine, and color theory. It was Pfeiffer’s early love of color that prompted him to later engage in scientific research. He wanted to know what made some paintings beautiful, and others not. He wanted to understand his visual experiences and learn about how colors created harmony like musical chords. Pfeiffer was a student at the Bauhaus in both Weimar and Dessau and attended painting classes taught by Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky. He became especially close to Klee and was greatly influenced by the older artist’s work in color theory. Pfeiffer found traditional painting unsatisfying and wanted to apply order to what he saw as a process rather like trying to apply order after an explosion. For him, painting was an unconscious exercise in secret algebra and needed a strong theoretical background. He believed that colors, just like music, create vibrations within us. Beautiful colors contain a harmony capable of creating a silent concert. The key is applying the right pigments to bring about the proper qualities in regards to clarity, luminance and brilliance of a color. Much like the Greek concept of the Golden Ratio that was applied to poetry, sculpture and architecture, Pfeiffer believed that with the right proportions applied, colors would be in harmony.

Read a biography about Henri Pfeiffer (downloadable PDF-66kb)

Experiments in Color

Gallery Exhibition: March 2-31 2012