Fred Uhlman: In Captivity

Whangarei Art Museum brings to light one of the most notable and more obscure treasures of the national art collection at Te Papa - ‘Tossa’ 1936 - rarely exhibited and now brought to Northland, tells an incredible story of survival, spirit and tenacity throughout the dire days of Fascism in Europe.

The German Jewish artist Fred Uhlman (1901-1985) a highly qualified lawyer, had escaped Stuttgart in 1933 to Paris and the threat of Nazi death-camps only to be later embroiled in the Spanish Revolution at Tossa de Mar in 1936.

He fled yet again, just days before the national borders were closed. Along this journey into exile he was then interred by the British on the Isle of Man during the Blitz as an ‘enemy alien’ with other famous artists like Kurt Schwitters, Walter Gropius and Oscar Kokoschka.

Condemned by Hitler as ‘degenerate artists/entartete Kunstler’ – they were dual exiles and part of the great intellectual Diaspora which was to make London and New York the new epicentres of culture after the War.

The exhibition is a part of a suite of ‘Art in Exile’ exhibitions timed to coincide with concurrent exhibitions: Ey! Iran toured by Exhibition Services Ltd. and developed by the Gold Coast City Art Gallery; Baha’i Martyrs of Iran – Shahriar Asdollah-zadeh; and Exiles – Rudolf Boelee.

Curated by Scott Pothan.

Image: Fred Uhlman Two Cottages in Wales pastel n.d.c1950 private collection Whangarei

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