From September 28, 2023 to March 10, 2024, the Museo Casa di Goethe in Rome dedicates a retrospective to Max Peiffer Watenphul (Weferlingen, 1896 – Rome, 1976), curated by Gregor H. Lersch, director of the Museum.
Restless, independent, eclectic — a lawyer first, an artist later — Peiffer Watenphul studied at the Bauhaus in Weimar and moved in the avant-garde circles of the 1920s. He was an avid photographer of queer-identity subjects, a painter of cities and landscapes, and a tireless traveler, especially after one of his paintings was included in the 1937 "Degenerate Art" exhibition.
The exhibition at Casa di Goethe traces, through 33 paintings and 14 photographs, the persistence of Bauhaus ideas in his painting and photography, following his journey from Germany to Italy and contextualizing his work within the tradition of German artists in Italy and the German Sehnsucht for the Bel Paese.
During his studies at the Bauhaus in Weimar from 1919 to 1922, Peiffer Watenphul came into contact with Paul Klee, Johannes Itten, Otto Dix, Alexej von Jawlensky, and Oskar Schlemmer. His chromatic sensibility, already evident in works from the 1930s, becomes even more tangible in his postwar pieces, characterized by a subtle hazy atmospheric veil through which his subjects and urban landscapes — particularly his views of Venice and Rome — seem to filter.
Born on September 1, 1896 in Weferlingen, near Braunschweig, Peiffer Watenphul studied law before enrolling at the Bauhaus in 1919. After the Nazis listed him as a degenerate artist in 1937, he traveled to Italy, eventually settling permanently in Rome from 1957 until his death on July 13, 1976. He is buried at the Non-Catholic Cemetery in Rome.
A key focus of the exhibition is the queer dimension of his photography: shots of muscular men and dissolute women, heavily made up, covered in jewels and fabrics, taken between the 1920s and 1930s — related to what Elisabeth Otto has defined as "queer Bauhaus." The exhibition also includes a site-specific installation by Ruth Beraha inspired by Peiffer Watenphul's Still Life with Flowers, shown at the 1937 Degenerate Art exhibition and subsequently lost.
Exhibition: Max Peiffer Watenphul. From the Bauhaus to Italy
Curator: Gregor H. Lersch
Open: September 28, 2023 – March 10, 2024
Venue: Museo Casa di Goethe, via del Corso 18, 00186 Rome
Hours: Tuesday–Sunday, 10:00–18:00, last entry 17:30; closed Monday
Tickets: Full €6 | Reduced €5 | Family (2 adults + max 3 children) €17 | Free: children under 10, ICOM members
Info: +39 06 326 504 12 | [email protected] | www.casadigoethe.it
