Max Laeuger

The architect, painter and ceramist Max Laeuger was one of the most important representatives of Art Nouveau in Germany and one of the founders of the German Werkbund in 1907. He was a professor of figure drawing and decoration at the Technical University in Karlsruhe and was also active as an urban planner, landscape gardener and bridge builder. He is regarded as one of the 20th Century pioneers in ceramics.

In 1900, Laeuger received a Gold Medal at the Paris World Fair and another one in 1904 for the design of the German division at the St. Louis World Fair. For the Reichssportfeld in Berlin he designed the building ceramics in 1935-36. His hometown of Lörrach awarded him honorary citizenship in 1939. In 1944 Laeuger was awarded the Goethe Medal for Art and Science, one of the highest artistic awards of Nazi Germany. The “Grand Prix” at the Triennial of Milan in 1951 once again clearly showed the international significance of his ceramic creations.

In 1928, Laeuger won the bronze medal for his Design For Town Planning Entwurf zum Stadtpark Hamburg 1908 (Design of town park for Hamburg in 1908). It had been created for a competition that the city had advertised. The Hamburg municipal park was opened in 1914, but no competition design was implemented unchanged. The final plan came from Hamburg’s building director Fritz Schumacher, who, however, was strongly geared to Laeuger’s design. Responsible for the horticultural facilities was Otto Linne, another Olympian. In the same year 1928, Laeuger also submitted a majolica (tin-glazed pottery) with the title Women on Horseback (also called Two Amazons on Horses). The work was created in 1925 and is in the collection of the Badisches Landesmuseum Karlsruhe. Four years later he participated again in the Art Competitions as a sculptor with a Ceramic bowl and a High relief.