Arno Mohr

Arno Mohr (29 July 1910 – 23 May 2001) was a German painter and graphic artist, primarily associated with the German Democratic Republic and, more particularly, with Berlin. Almost unknown in the west, his work was popular in East Germany, notably for his reductionist observational drawings of everyday life.

Life Arno Mohr was born in Posen which at that time was in Germany. His father is variously described as "an officer" Between 1924 and 1927 Mohr undertook an apprenticeship as a sign painter with a firm in the city called Ladewig & Co and embarked on a life as a journeyman artist. In 1929/30 he was attending evening classes at the Arts and Crafts College. At this time he got to know Otto Dix as well as the artist and printer Alfred Erhardt. This led to the establishment of a printing workshop at the Weisseensee Academy, with Arno Mohr in charge of it. It also led him subsequently to set up his own printing workshop in Berlin-Lichtenberg.

Works and exhibitions Between 1950 and 1990 Arno Mohr's work featured in numerous solo and joint exhibitions, both within the German Democratic Republic and abroad. His portraits of Bertolt Brecht and Helene Weigel are particularly well known, as is his 1989 landscape " Blick zum Bode-Museum".

In 2000 a particularly high-profile exhibition of his work took place at the Academy of Arts in Berlin.

Awards, honours and memberships

1961 Käthe Kollwitz Prize 1962 Goethe Prize from the City of Berlin 1970 Membership of the Berlin Academy of Arts 1974 Chairman if the National League of Visual Artists 1980 National Prize of East Germany 1st Class for Arts and Literature 1984 Order of Karl Marx 1985 Goethe Prize from the City of Berlin (repeat award) 1993 Membership of the Berlin Academy of Arts-Brandenburg (post reunification)