Werner Peiner was first influenced by realism, and later by New Objectivity, but he would become known as one of the most talented official painters of the Third Reich.
17 Facts About Werner Peiner
1.
2.
Werner Peiner grew up in Dusseldorf, where his father had risen to become the managing director of a wood wholesaler.
3.
Werner Peiner was promoted to lieutenant and served on the western front.
4.
In 1923 Werner Peiner married Marie Therese "Resi" Lauffs and moved to Bonn to live with his in-laws.
5.
In 1931, Werner Peiner settled in Kronenburg and began converting several houses in the historic town center into a studio.
6.
Werner Peiner played a key role in the construction of the sewage system in Kronenburg, as the sewage running across the street bothered him.
7.
Werner Peiner succeeded Heinrich Campendonk, who had been dismissed shortly before.
8.
Werner Peiner owed his appointment not only to his acquaintance with the provisional director of the art academy, Julius Paul Junghanns, but probably to his painting Deutsche Erde, or German Land, with which he supported the emerging Nazi ideology of blood and soil.
9.
Werner Peiner applied for admission to the NSDAP on July 13,1937, and was admitted retrospectively to May 1.
10.
In 1944, Werner Peiner moved with his wife to Gimborn in Oberbergisches Land.
11.
Werner Peiner lived and worked there until his death, in 1984.
12.
Werner Peiner was mostly inspired by the old masters, such as Pieter Bruegel the Elder.
13.
Werner Peiner had an realistic style, which made him successful with his private clients.
14.
Werner Peiner's Nazi commissioned works included the cycle of the German Battles of Fate for the Marble Gallery, known as the Long Hall, of the New Reich Chancellery, in Berlin, the drafts of which are now exhibited in the Rheinisches Landesmuseum Bonn.
15.
Werner Peiner created drafts, and the theme of a seventh tapestry, measuring 5.40 by 10 meters, related to battles of Germany's history, namely The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, Heinrich I in the Battle of Hungary, The Siege of Marienburg, The Battle of the Turks near Vienna, Frederick the Great near Kunersdorf, The Battle of Leipzig, and Tank Battle of Cambrai.
16.
Werner Peiner created the cartoon for the monumental tapestry Die Erdkugel, begun but not completed at the Paris Manufacture des Gobelins and destined for Hermann Goring's monumental Carinhall estate.
17.
Werner Peiner was represented with 33 works at the Great German Art Exhibitions, in the Munich House of German Art, from 1937 to 1944.