Thomas Bayrle

Thomas Bayrle (born 7 November 1937) is a German sculptor, painter, graphic artist, and video artist. He is known for being a pop artist.

Life Thomas Bayrle was born on 7 November 1937 in Berlin. He is the son of the painter and graphic artist Alf Bayrle and the art historian Elisabeth Weiss.

Bayrle wanted to become a textile engineer, and completed a two-year apprenticeship as a pattern designer and weaver in 1956. While working on Jacquard looms in Göppingen, Bayrle became inspired by the machine's rhythmic sound and the repetitive patterns of the fabric.

From 1958 to 1961, Bayrle studied at the Werkkunstschule Offenbach. Initially, he wanted to study commercial art, but he turned to printmaking and learned the technique of lithography and etching from Eberhard Behr.

In 1961, he founded the Gulliver Press together with Bernhard Jäger and made a name for himself as a printer and publisher of artists' books. In 1995 he held a visiting professorship at Tohoku University in Japan. In 2002 he retired.

Bayrle was married to the artist Helke Bayrle (1941–2022).

Since March 2018, the Municipal Gallery in the Lenbachhaus and Kunstbau in Munich has been showing some of the artist's futuristic compositions. As part of the exhibition, I'm a Believer. Pop Art and contemporary art from the Lenbachhaus and the KiCo Foundation will present the large-format sculpture "Autostrada" (2003) and other graphic wall panels from the collection.

Awards 1970: Prize of the Second British International Print Biennale, Bradford 1971: Stipendium Villa Massimo, Rome 1995: Preis der Ars Electronica in Linz 1997: Binding-Kulturpreis der Binding-Kulturstiftung, Frankfurt 1998: Hessian Cultural Prize, Wiesbaden 2000: KUNSTKÖLN-Preis (from 2006: Cologne-Fine-Art-Preis) 2007: Goethe Plaque of the City of Frankfurt 2012: Arnold-Bode-Preis