{"data":{"id":"133","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":133,"topgoose_id":2875,"tms_id":133,"display_name":"Oscar Bluemner","sort_name":"Bluemner Oscar","display_date":"1867–1938","begin_date":"1867","end_date":"1938","biography":"\u003cp\u003eOscar Bluemner worked as an architect,\ninitially in Germany and later in the United\nStates, before turning to painting full time in\n1911. By then he was already a frequent\nvisitor to Alfred Stieglitz’s pioneering 291\ngallery in New York, and eventually became\na member of its inner circle of modern\nartists. The paintings he debuted in his 1915\ninaugural exhibition at 291 married prismatic,\narchitectonic forms with boldly saturated\ncolors that combined his training as an\narchitect with his desire to “bring the colors\nof things to enormous splendor.” His belief\nthat colors could stir feelings and mood,\nmuch as music does, led him to develop a\nsystem of symbolism that identified\nspecific colors with psychological states.\n\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn \u003ca href=\"/collection/works/1992\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eA Situation in Yellow \u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003eBluemner\ncombined predominantly yellow and black\ncolors (identified with light and sorrow,\nrespectively) with images of nature and\nman-made forms to portray what he\nbelieved were the fundamental polarities\nof body and soul, life and death, and male\nand female.\n\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBy 1930 he was using images\nof houses and trees as surrogates\nfor what he called the “Ego and the Altera\n[the other] . . . the Duality in ourselves\nas well as in Nature.” Treating these\nopposing forces as protagonists, he set\nthe scene in A \u003cem\u003eSituation in Yellow\u003c/em\u003e as an\narchetypical drama between “man . . .\nEgo” (represented by houses) and “she . . .\nnon Ego” (represented by trees). In this\nwork, as in others he made after 1933,\nBluemner affirmed his admiration for\nNorthern Renaissance masters by signing\nhis work with the pseudonym Florianus,\na Latinized version of the name Bluemner,\nmeaning \u003cem\u003eflower\u003c/em\u003e or \u003cem\u003eblossom\u003c/em\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500027801","wikidata_id":"Q215773","created_at":"2017-08-30T17:38:31.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-03-31T07:01:22.008-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/133/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/133/exhibitions"}}}}