Nancy Tanneberger

From Waldenburg to Rome
The painter and art school reformer
Moritz Meurer (1839–1916)

Karl Blossfeldt‘s plant photographs aroused a great deal of interest worldwide during the course of the 20th century. The work of his mentor Moritz Meurer, on the other hand, which was a source of both guidance and inspiration for Blossfeldt and pursued the same goal, sank almost into oblivion. Born in Waldenburg, Saxony, Moritz Meurer lived and taught for many years as a decorative painter in Berlin before becoming a protagonist of an arts and crafts reform movement calling for a whole new approach to the study of nature in the applied arts.

Cologne, March 2009