A collector's passion for Klee forms exhibit

Art Business News, April, 2003

Scientist, professor and author Dr. Carl Djerassi is also known as a distinguished collector of work by artist Paul Klee. For the first time, Djerassi's complete Klee collection is on view at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA).

Featuring 140 works that range from Klee's years as a high school student until his death in 1940, the exhibition reveals a comprehensive look at the 20th-century avant-garde master. The collection is primarily composed of works on paper and is almost evenly divided in number between Klee's prints, drawings and watercolors.

The Swiss artist grew up in a musical family and was himself a violinist. Ultimately he opted to study art and in 1900 trained with Franz von Stuck at the Munich Academy, where he first met painter Vasily Kandinsky. Klee's friendship with Kandinsky prompted him to join Der Blaue Reiter, an expressionist group pivotal to the development of abstract art. Later, Klee taught at the Bauhaus from 1920 to 31; in 1931 he accepted a position at the Dusseldorf Academy, but was soon dismissed by the Nazis, who included 17 of his works in their infamous exhibition of "degener ate art" in 1937. In 1933, Klee developed the crippling collagen disease, scleroderma; he died from its complications in 1940.

SHOW FACTS

"A Passion for Paul Klee"

Through June 8

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

Address: 151 Third Street San Francisco, CA

Phone: (415) 357-4000

Web site: www.sfmoma.org