 (1888–1976) was one of the most influential abstract painters and art teachers of the twentieth century. Albers's artistic career, which bridged European and American Modernism, consisted mainly of a tightly focused investigation into the perceptual properties of color and spatial relationships. Working with simple geometric forms, Albers sought to produce the effects of chromatic interaction, in which the visual perception of a color is affected by the hues adjacent to it. Albers's precise application of color also created plays of space and depth, as the planar colored shapes that make up the majority of his works appear to either recede into or protrude out of the picture plane.

Albers was born in Bottrop, Germany, and studied briefly at the Königliche Bayerische Akademie der Bildenden Kunst, Munich, in 1919, before becoming a student at the Weimar Bauhaus in 1920. In 1922, Albers joined the school’s faculty, first working in stained glass and, starting in 1923, teaching design. In 1933, he and Anni Albers emigrated to North Carolina, where they founded the art department at Black Mountain College. During their time at Black Mountain, Albers began to show his work extensively within the United States, including solo exhibitions at the Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, Massachusetts (1935); J.B. Neumann’s New Art Circle, New York (1936, 1938); The Germanic Museum at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts (1936); Katharine Kuh Gallery, Chicago (1937); San Francisco Museum of Art (1940); and the Nierendorf Gallery, New York (1941). The Alberses remained at Black Mountain until 1949 and, in 1950, moved to New Haven, Connecticut, where Josef Albers was invited to direct a newly formed department of design at the Yale University School of Art. In 1950, too, he developed what would become his seminal 

series, which he continued to elaborate until his death in 1976. This body of work was featured in a major exhibition organized by The Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1964 that traveled to twenty-two venues in the United States and Latin America. Albers retired from teaching in 1958, a few years prior to the publication of his important text 

(1963), which was reissued in two volumes in 2013. Following numerous gallery and museum exhibitions, as well as his participation in Documenta I (1955) and Documenta 4 (1968), Albers became the first living artist to be the subject of a solo exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, with his career-spanning retrospective there in 1971.

Painting on Paper: Josef Albers in America

, which originated at the Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich (2010; traveled to Josef Albers Museum, Quadrat, Bottrop, Germany; Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark; Kunstmuseum Basel; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; Centro de Arte Moderna, Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon; and the Morgan Library and Museum, New York); 

Josef Albers: Minimal Means, Maximum Effect

 at the Fundación Juan March, Madrid (2014; traveled to Henie Onstad Art Centre, Høvikodden, Norway); and 

A Beautiful Confluence: Anni and Josef Albers and the Latin American World 

at Mudec, Museo delle Culture, Milan (2015–2016). From 2016 to 2017, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, presented 

One and One Is Four: The Bauhaus Photocollages of Josef Albers

was presented at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and traveled to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, in 2018. 

was on view at the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris in 2021 and subsequently traveled to IVAM (Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno), Valencia, Spain, in 2022. At the Josef Albers Museum in Bottrop, Germany, 

 was on view from 2022 to 2023. The artist’s first retrospective exhibition in Japan, 

, was on view at the Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art, Sakura, Japan, in 2023.

The Josef and Anni Albers Foundation has been exclusively represented by David Zwirner since 2016. The same year, 

Josef Albers: Grey Steps, Grey Scales, Grey Ladders

 was presented at the gallery’s New York location. 

was on view at David Zwirner, London, in 2017. David Zwirner, New York, presented 

 at its Hong Kong location, and in 2023, 

 was presented at the gallery’s London location, in tandem with the group exhibition 

Black Mountain College: The Experimenters

Work by Albers is held in important public and private collections worldwide.

Preface by Nicholas Fox Weber. Text by Kelly Feeney

This catalogue for a traveling exhibition considers the working drawings and spontaneous studies of Josef Albers, beginning with the landscapes and figure studies he created before enrolling at the Bauhaus, to abstractions inspired by archeological sites in Mexico, to color studies for his famous 

 paintings. An essay by the curator Kelly Feeney notes important influences and explores the development of Albers’s “seeing.”

Out of print

Josef Albers: Works on Paper

Josef Albers: Works on Paper | Books

David Zwirner is an art gallery with locations in New York, Los Angeles, London, Paris and Hong Kong. We present physical and online exhibitions, podcasts, books, and more.