Klee, << klay, >> Paul (1879-1940), ranks among the greatest and most original masters of modern painting. Klee’s thousands of paintings, drawings, and prints are masterpieces of fantasy, wit, and invention. His pictures are usually small and filled with childlike symbols and writing that hint at a mysterious inner vision of the world and its inhabitants. Klee worked in water color, ink, and graphite, as well as in oils.
Klee was born on Dec. 18, 1879, near Bern, Switzerland, but established himself as an artist after moving to Germany. He became the friend of painters Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc and exhibited with their Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) group just before World War I. Klee taught at the Bauhaus school of design from 1920 to 1929. He left Germany in 1933 when the Nazis gained power. He moved to Switzerland and spent the rest of his life there. Some of his ideas on art have been published as the Pedagogical Sketchbook. Klee died on June 29, 1940.
