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Collections

Margrit Kallin-Fischer
Composition with Spherical Shapescirca 1930

Not on view
Black and white photograph of smooth spheres and a diagonal rod arranged against a black background, with reflections on a glossy surface below

Margrit Kallin-Fischer, Composition with Spherical Shapes, circa 1930, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Purchased with funds provided by the Ralph M. Parsons Fund, photo © Museum Associates/LACMA

Artist or Maker
Margrit Kallin-Fischer
Germany, 1897-1973
Title
Composition with Spherical Shapes
Place Made
Germany
Date Made
circa 1930
Medium
Gelatin silver print
Dimensions
Image: 6 1/16 × 4 1/4 in. (15.4 × 10.8 cm) Primary support: 6 1/16 × 4 1/4 in. (15.4 × 10.8 cm) Secondary support: 12 13/16 × 7 9/16 in. (32.54 × 19.21 cm) Mat: 20 × 16 in. (50.8 × 40.64 cm)
Credit Line
Purchased with funds provided by the Ralph M. Parsons Fund
Accession Number
M.89.43.3
Classification
Photographs
Collecting Area
Photography
Curatorial Notes

Margrit Kallin-Fischer (née Vries), called Grit, was born in Frankfurt and studied painting in Marburg and Leipzig between 1911 and 1917. After World War I, she moved to Berlin and joined the circles of artists there. She met the Russian émigré musician Marik Kallin, and they married in 1920. In 1926, Grit Kallin enrolled at the Bauhaus as an already fully trained artist. Following the basic course with Josef Albers and painting classes with Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky, she studied in the metal workshop with László Moholy-Nagy and contributed to Oskar Schlemmer’s theater class, where she met the American Bauhaus member Edward L. Fischer (whom she would marry in 1934). She also took her first photographs while at the Bauhaus, perhaps including this study of spheres, which were quintessential Bauhaus forms, along with cubes and pyramids. Starting in 1930, Kallin published images in the well-known journal Gebrauchsgraphik (Commercial Graphics) and soon exhibited alongside major figures from the photography and advertising scene such as Herbert Bayer, Moholy-Nagy, Adolf de Meyer, and Florence Henri. Photographic activity receded in 1935, when she and Fischer moved to New York and she focused mainly on sculpture and graphic design.

Britt Salvesen

2024