Wolfgang Tümpel

The Bauhaus artist Wolfgang Tümpel is the grandfather of Fine Art Partners co-founder Daniel Tümpel. Fine Art Partners is responsible for the management of his estate.

Wolfgang Tümpel (1903-1978) was both a goldsmith and silversmith as well as one of the pioneering designers for industrial production. After studying at the Bauhaus in Weimar under Johannes Itten, Paul Klee and László Moholy-Nagy Tümpel continued his training as a silversmith at the Burg Giebichenstein school for the apllied arts

Wolfgang Tümpel was on a quest for "valid form" achieved by applying a new approach to design. Working under the slogan "modern but not modish", Wolfgang Tümpel did not settle for a single style but produced functional designs often based on volumetric forms which could be industrially manufactured. He designed for Goldschmidt & Schwabe (1927), metal objects for WMF (Württembergische Metallwaren Fabrik, 1929) and silverware for Bruckmann & Söhne. The 1931 desk lamp No. 03086 Tümpel designed for Bünte & Remmler is one of the earliest mass-produced lamps featuring a tubular bulb (festoon lighting) as the light source. Another celebrated Tümpel design is his 1962 brass and plastic coffee jar, which were made for the German coffee company Tchibo.

His work is represented e.g. in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London and the Bauhaus Museum, Berlin. Since 1936 he ongoingly participated in shows e.g. at the Werkbundausstellung (Cologne, 1949), Museum für Kulturgeschichte in Bielefeld in 1973 and the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe (Hamburg, 1978). His solo exhibition `Wolfgang Tümpel 1903-1978. Ein Bauhauskünstler aus Bielefeld´ was held at the Museum Hülsmann in 2003 and the Museum Postsparkasse in Vienna in 2006, followed 2010 by the exhibition `Modern but not Modish´ in Gotha.

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