Schermuly, Peter

painter

born: 19.10.1927 in Frankfurt am Main

died: 06.06.2007 in Cesenatico (Italy)

The painter Otto Ritschl enabled Schermuly to study painting in his studio in 1947. In 1950, Schermuly joined the Künstlergruppe50, of which he was chairman for some time.

During a stay in the Engadin in 1953/54, he came into contact with Hans Arp, whose suggestions supported his inclination towards the absurd. Schermuly wrote a cycle of neo-Dadaist poems, parts of which were published in the Hermit Press in 1958. Hans Arp and Fernand Léger arranged for Schermuly to study at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris in 1955/56. In 1960, he was commissioned to paint portraits of Christian Stock and Dr. Georg August Zinn, the Minister Presidents of the State of Hesse. Schermuly lived in Paris again from 1961-64 and began to move away from abstract painting. Real bodies began to appear in his paintings. He studied the Venetians and French painting between Nicolas Poussin and Jacques-Louis David in the Louvre.

In 1965, the Museum Wiesbaden showed the first results of this development process. The retrospective "Oil Paintings 1948-1986" took place in 1989/90. From the very beginning, Schermuly's painting was accompanied by his teaching of art theory. His film "A Titian by Rubens", which was produced for ARD in 1969, contains an almost aphoristic summary of his work. His paintings have been shown in solo exhibitions in Europe, the USA and Russia.

Schermuly lived in Munich from 1978-2007. His grave is in Munich's North Cemetery.