Landscape, Provence, France

Biography of Franz Priking ( 1929-1979, German )

Franz Priking (1929-1979) Born August 7, 1929 in Mülheim (Rhineland). His father introduced him to artistic knowledge very early on. The years between 1939-1945, war marked young Franz forever. After the war between, 1945-1947 Priking discovered expressionism, a movement which had been completely obscured by official Nazi art. For Priking, it revealed a revelation and he would remain faithful to the general principles of this School all his life. After his fathers death in1947, he left to study at the Bauhaus in Weimar then at the Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin where he was the pupil of Max Pechstein, one of the founders of the Die Brücke movement. After a meeting with Bertold Brecht in 1948, he was offered hospitality for ten months which began his introduction to Socialist Realism. In 1950, Priking had a short stay in Paris, later moving to the South of France and settled temporarily in Villeneuve lès Avignon. 1951, he had his first collective exhibition at the Réattu Museum in Arles. In 1952 , Priking went to Vallauris to have his first meeting with Picasso and stays for eight months. The Master advised and encouraged him by telling him “You will be one of the best painters of your generation”.  In 1955, He had his first major solo exhibition at Galerie Motte in Geneva, then at Drouant-David in Paris in 1957. He continued to have exhibitions until his death, featured in Paris, London, Geneva, Rome, Brussels, Strasbourg, Aix en Provence, Menton, Tokyo, and Sao-Paulo, among others. In 1958, Priking was the winner of the Young Painting Prize in Paris. Other notable recognitions include a becoming an elected member of the International Institute of Arts and Letters of Geneva in 1961, and the prize of the Mediterranean Union of Modern Art in 1972  and the Léonard de Vinci Prize.

MAIN MUSEUMS AND PUBLIC COLLECTIONS In France: MNAM Paris, Musée CALVET in Avignon In Italy: Vatican Museum (Rome) In America: Museum of Santiago (Chile), Museum of Santa-Fé (Mexico) In the United States works by Franz Priking are present in no less than thirty-nine Museums, Foundations and Universities.

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