Hartwig, Josef (1880 Munich - 1956 Frankfurt am Main)

Lot 2532 limit € 800

The Bauhaus chess game, design: Josef Hartwig 1924, so-called "Version XVI", wood, partly stained black, complete set of figures in the original rectangular beech box, stamped "HARTWIG BAUHAUS DESSAU GES. GES." in the hinged lid, figures in Good condition with minor signs of wear, box with signs of age, clasp incomplete, box approx. 6.6 x 14.4 x 14.4 cm, made by Bauhaus Dessau 1925-1929, Josef Hartwig studied stonemason and sculptor at the Munich Art Academy after an apprenticeship . From 1910 he worked as a sculptor in Berlin. In 1921, the first Bauhaus director, Walter Gropius, called him to the Bauhaus Weimar, where he held the position of foreman in the wood and stone sculpture workshop until the Bauhaus moved to Dessau. In 1925 Hartwig moved to the art school in Frankfurt (Städelschule), where he headed the sculpture workshop until 1945. As early as 1922, Josef Hartwig was busy designing a chess set. After various attempts at form, the "Bauhaus Chess Set" was presented at the Leipzig Fair in 1924, which radically broke with the previously customary form of turned and richly decorated figures and reduced the form to cubes, spheres and cylinders. A total of seven form variants of the game are known. With its clear, functionalist design, the Bauhaus chess set is one of the icons of Bauhaus product history. Cf. Lit.: Anne Bobzin, Klaus Weber: "The Bauhaus chess game by Josef Hartwig", Berlin 2006.