graphic artist, book illustrator, stage designer and writer
Spouse
Günther Böhmer
Bele Bachem (née Renate Gabriele Bachem) (17 May 1916 – 5 June 2005) was a German graphic artist, book illustrator, stage designer and writer. In 1997, Bachem was awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.
Life and work
Rosenthal (company) porcelain plate with decoration designed by Bele Bachem.
Bele Bachem was the daughter of the painter Gottfried Maria Bachem and his wife Hedwig. She was born, and spent her childhood, in Düsseldorf. She went to Berlin University of the Arts at the end of the 1920s, where she was taught by Ludwig Bartning and Max Kraus. Her work quickly attracted attention and she was able to pursue her own style undisturbed. Soon she received her first assignments and was finally taken to Munich by Otto Falckenberg to create stage sets at the theater. In 1940 she married the art historian Günther Böhmer, (died 1992), and later that year their daughter was born. Shortly thereafter, their work was denounced by the National Socialists, and, within a year, public exhibitions of her work were banned.[1]
After the war, Bachem published drawings in the satirical magazine Der Simpl and eventually resumed working on stage designs for the theatre. She illustrated and wrote books and designed for films. From 1954 to 1956 she was a lecturer in the Department of Illustration at the Werkkunstschule in Offenbach am Main. Bachem supplied numerous designs for the porcelain manufacturer Rosenthal and for the wallpaper factory Brascha Rasch.
Bachem is regarded as one of the most important German post-war artists and is, besides Unica Zürn, one of the few surrealists of German literature illustration.[2]
Book illustrations
Clemens Brentano: Gockel, Hinkel und Gackeleia. Mit farbigen Illustrationen von Bele Bachem. Hamburg, Ellermann, 1952.
Peter Scher: Drollige Käuze. Mit 20 Zeichnungen von Bele Bachem. (= Deutsche Soldatenbücherei Band 12), Siegismund, Berlin 1940.
Catull: Liebesgedichte. Lateinisch und Deutsch, neu übertragen von Carl Fischer. Mit 48 Zeichnungen von Bele Bachem. Emil Vollmer Verlag, Wiesbaden o.J.
Altchinesische Liebesgeschichten. Ins Deutsche übertragen von Franz Kuhn. Mit 28 Illustrationen von Bele Bachem. Emil Vollmer Verlag, Wiesbaden o.J.
Lukian: Hetärengespräche. Übertragen von Carl Fischer. Mit 33 Zeichnungen von Bele Bachem. Emil Vollmer Verlag, Wiesbaden o.J.
Ernst R. Lehmann-Leander (Hrsg.): Der Gürtel der Aphrodite. 100 erotische Gedichte aus 1000 Jahren antiker Kultur. Mit 26 Zeichnungen von Bele Bachem. Emil Vollmer Verlag, Wiesbaden o.J.
Bodo Brodt: Parlez-moi d'amour ! Kleine Biographie des Schlagers. Mit Illustrationen von Bele Bachem. Offenbach/Main 1956.
Stefan Békeffy: Der Hund, der Herr Bozzi hieß. Schutzumschlag, Einbandzeichnung und Illustrationen von Bele Bachem. Berlin 1959.
Hansjürgen Weidlich: Liebesgeschichten für Schüchterne. 17 Illustrationen (einschl. Umschlag), Agentur des Rauhen Hauses, Hamburg 1959.
Günther Schwenn: Zwischen sämtlichen Musen. Espresso-Elegien. Peters-Verlag, Berlin 1964.
Vom Sklaven der Liebe. Die schönsten erotischen Geschichten aus 1001 Nacht. Nymphenburger Verlagsanstalt, München 1980.
Published works
Bele Bachem: Rosenwasser ausverkauft. Düsseldorf 1977.
Bele Bachem: Signatur Objekt Nr. 2: Dein Gestern – Dein Schatten. Rolandseck 1985.
Bele Bachem: Eine übliche kleine Bosheit. Düsseldorf 1980.
Awards
1952: Poster Prize "Toulouse-Lautrec" of the City of Paris
