Geyer Studio, a calligraphy studio in New York City, for whom Ismar David consulted , did design work and taught workshops from approximately 1969–1987.
Geyer Studio Greeting Card, 1975/76.
Geyer Studio, one of several calligraphy/engrossing studios in NYC. Another was Malcolm & Hayes. These establishments had been around for a long time. Their bread and butter was producing and filling in the names of certificates of all kinds. They also made individual, one-of-a-kind proclamations and citations. According to Marion Andrews, an engrosser from earlier days and an accomplished watercolorist, old Mr. Geyer used to say, “If you can’t make a living between 9 and 5, you should get out of the business.” Harold Yardlan was the second owner of Geyer Studio. His daughter Stephanie succeeded him.
Lore Lilien was married to Otto M. Lilien. The couple emigrated from Berlin to Jerusalem and applied for citizenship in 1939, with their two daughters.
Otto Magnus Jaacob Lilien, 1907–1991, electrical engineer, expert in photogravure, author
Otto Lilien was the son of Ephraim Moses Lilien (1874– 1925) an illustrator and printmaker, particularly noted for his art on Jewish themes and sometimes called the “first Zionist artist.” His wife, Lore Lilien, was a goldsmith. The couple emigrated from Berlin to Jerusalem and applied for citizenship in 1939, with their two daughters.
Städtische Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule Berlin-Charlottenburg, arts & crafts school in Berlin.
Städtische Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule Berlin-Charlottenburg.
The municipal arts and crafts school in Charlottenburg, Berlin had its beginnings in 1861. The imposing building on Eosanderstrasse was built in 1900. As a result of bombing in 1943, the building and its records burned completely. Ismar David attended the school between 1928 and 1932. His teachers included: Johannes Boehland and Hans Orlowsky.
Ismar David’s certificate from the Städische Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule Berlin West, Charlottenburg, 1932.
Städtische Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau, the municipal arts & crafts school in the city of Breslau.
The movement to establish state-funded vocational arts schools in Germany gained traction in the mid nineteenth century with the advent of international expositions and under the influence of British efforts to foster applied art. Many German cities, mostly in the west, founded their own arts and crafts schools. In the large eastern areas of the country, only a handful were initiated, with provincial capital Breslau home to two of them, the Staatliche Akademie für Kunst und Kunstgewerbe and the Städtische Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule.
Ismar David attended the latter, the Municipal Arts and Crafts School of Breslau from the fall of 1927 through the spring of 1928, at the end of his apprenticeship and before he left his hometown for Berlin. The school was still struggling to emerge from the massive trauma inflicted by the aftermath of the First World War and disastrous hyperinflation. Long time director and professor Richard Heyer had retired in 1925 after twenty-five years service and the relatively new administration faced dilapidated and woefully inadequate accommodations for just about everything. (In 1929, the student body would still derisively call their Mardi Gras festivities, “Fest der Hinterhäusler,” which might be roughly translated to Slum Dwellers Celebration.”)1 Städtische Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau: Bericht 1926, 1927, 1928 der Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau, p. 8 Under the new director, architect Gustav Wolf, the school developed an extensive renovation plan that included support for a needy student population. In further recognition of the economic austerity of the era, the ethos of the school became “to still make necessities enjoyable, but to net clear effects with low expenditure of power and materials. … Making expensive things for the refined tastes of a small circle of connoisseurs isn’t paramount. Rather, we try to make useful things that most people need in their daily lives.”2 Städtische Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau: Bericht 1926, 1927, 1928 der Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau, p. 8
As its name implies the school received significant support from city authorities, with Silesian professional organizations contributing financially as well as administratively. This leadership saw the institution’s role as defending the cultural integrity of geographically isolated Silesia against absorption by a greater Germany and promoting Silesian arts and crafts, while offering the best possible training for the school’s mostly Silesian student body. Work experience was a general prerequisite for students, and the faculty were all active professionals in their respective fields. The multi-disciplinary institution vigorously cultivated cooperation among the various disciplines it offered: interior construction; applied sculpture, painting and graphics; metal work; glass decoration; porcelain painting; ceramics; book arts; tailoring, dressmaking and theater set construction; with each department having its own workshop or extensive series of workshops. (The book arts department alone had workshops in lithography, photochemical plate-making, hand and mechanical typesetting, letterpress and copperplate printing and bookbinding.)
All of Ismar David’s classes, however, came under the heading of general instruction. According to his certificate-cum-report card, Ismar David attended classes for exactly 6 months, with a total of 47 hours of classes per week—which accords with the normal schedule for a full-time attendee in a crafts school in those days (48 hours per week).3 Städtische Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau: Bericht 1926, 1927, 1928 der Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule Breslau, p. 4 His choice of classes reflected his need to remediate his drawing skills: freehand drawing and representation (Hermann Holscher), nude model/figurative drawing (Ludwig Peter Kowalski), Freehand drawing (Georg Krause), drawing for commercial graphics (Gerhard Stein), anatomic drawing (Holscher), calligraphy and letter drawing (Krause). He had 2 hours a week of art history (Siegfried Haertel) and 6 per week calculating charges (Krause) as well. His teachers all deemed his work “sufficient” to “good” and his conduct “praiseworthy.” They affirmed his suitability for decorative painting. He was ready for his next step, the Municipal Arts and Crafts School Charlottenburg in Berlin.
Certificate from the Handwerker- und Kunstgewerbeschule zu Breslau.
MAIN INSTRUCTION
Week-hours
Grade
Effort
Teacher
Free drawing and representation
6
sufficient
good
Holscher
STUDIO INSTRUCTION
Nude model Figurative drawing
6
sufficient
Very good
Kowalski
SUPPLEMENTARY INSTRUCTION
Calligraphy and letter drawing
6
good
good
G. Krause
Calculating charges
6
good
Very good
Prof. Krause
Art history
2
Without exam
Very good
Prof. Haertel
Law and business administration
Free drawing
12
Suffiently good
good
Prof. Krause
Graphic drawing
6
Rather good
good
Stein
Anatomic drawing
3
good
Very good
Holscher
General remarks about conduct, attendance and professional suitability: Conduct: commendable, regular attendance; suitability for decorative painting: good
Hortense Mendel, 1900–1960, publicity director at the Composing Room, married Ismar David on June 3, 1953.
An undated snapshot of Hortense Mendel.
Hortense Mendel was born in New York City on November 19, 1900, the daughter of a German-born father and a New York-born mother. When she applied for her first passport in 1925 for a trip to Europe with her widowed mother, the clerk described her as 5 feet 9½ inches tall with a low, wide forehead, dark brown eyes, a long nose, large-full lips, a medium chin and a sallow complexion. Her face was oval and she wore eyeglasses. In those days, she was a secretary- stenographer.
She had already worked for various advertising agencies and art magazines before The Composing Room’s magazine, PM, noted her brief vacation in December 1935, after Amalgamated Agency, where she had been production manager, went out of business. She joined The Composing Room in 1936, where she served as typographic consultant and handled publicity. She was associate editor, with Robert Leslie, of PM, later A-D. From 1944, she co-curated the exhibitions that the firm began sponsoring in December of the year she began working there and is credited with identifying and promoting new talents, among them, Paul Rand. Her predecessor Percy Seitlin wrote:
It is easy to say that Bob Leslie has been lucky with his associates, and, as a matter of fact, it’s correct — he has. Miss Mendel has played an important part in conceiving and organizing some of the best shows A-D Gallery ever had, which is another way of saying some of the best shows in the art-in-industry field ever hung in this country. Since her name first appeared in connection with the gallery, there have been exhibits of Lester Beall, Paul Rand, Hugo Steiner-Prag, Alex Steinweiss, Ladislav Sutnar, Ben Rose and Will Burtin. Also a collection of Clarence Hornung’s early Americana, the work of the Book Jacket Designers’ Guild and a show on lettering and calligraphy.1Seitlin, Percy, The Story of the A-D Gallery, AIGA Journal, May 1949, vol. 2, #1.
She co-founded an informal group of women in the graphic arts. (Book designers Freda Browne and Alma Reese Cardi, art director Sybil Hastings, Sally Michaels and Alice Roberts were members.2Robert Leslie Papers, New York Public Library Manuscripts Division. She presumably first met Ismar David in 1947, when Helen Rossi arranged for him to meet Leslie. She would write to David from Havana in 1949, “I did not dream that I would miss you so much nor that I would feel almost guilty in my enjoyment of any beauty because you too were not beside me.”3Mendel, Hortense to Ismar David, undated letter.
At Mendel’s sudden, premature death from a heart attack, she had been married to David for six and a half years. Friends and colleagues remembered her vivacity, enthusiasm, warmth and hard work. As a 24-year-old, she had entered handwriting contest in the New York Daily News, won $10 and received this assessment from the graphologist: “This is the hand of a ‘go-getter’ and nothing short of a tie-up on the subway can keep Hortense away from her objective. She is snappy, lively, insistent and determined.”4New York Daily News, November 13, 1924, p. 14. He was spot on.
Hortense Mendel’s Hebrew Primer
A few pages from a beginning Hebrew book, part one, the alef-bet, by Kalman Bachrach, published in New York in 1941.
Hans Orlowski was the son of a master tailor, who moved his family from Insterburg, in East Prussia to nearby Königsburg, then to Potsdam, then finally to the Charlottenburg neighborhood in Berlin. In 1911, Orlowski began studies at the Städtische Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule Berlin-Charlottenburg, but World War I intervened. He was wounded in Serbia early on and thereafter worked as a draftsman in the War Ministry. Returning to his studies in Charlottenburg at the end of the war, he began teaching there in 1921 and was named professor in 1931. The school building, as well as Orlowski’s workshop, apartment and much of his work, was bombed out during the Second World War. After 1945 Orlowski taught at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste and was director of the department of applied arts. Concerning his own work, he was strict and self-critical,1os, Mit der Kraft der Phantasie, Preußische Allgemeine but he remained prodigiously creative—he is said to have worked in the last hours before his death2Osman, Silke, “…wenn Schönheit Verstnd bekommt, Das Ostpreußenblat. Hamburg, February 25, 1989, p. 7.” —painting in oil, tempera and mixed media, while, of course, continuing to produce wood cuts. He illustrated over 120 books, later favoring classics like, Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor (1953), Schiller’s Kassandra (1959) and Orpheus and Eurydice (1961) and The Psalms (1961).
On August 3, 1962, David wrote to publisher Wolfgang Tiessen seeking to purchase Orlowski’s Psalter and asking about the 68-year-old artist. An exchange of letters followed, with Tiessen going so far as to contact Orlowski on David’s behalf. On August 16th, Tiessen wrote:
Heute kam auch ein Brief von Herrn Prof. Orlowski, der gerade in Urlaub am Luganer See ist, und zwar bis Anfang Oktober, (Adress: Carnago bei Lugano, Schweiz; Pension Deserto).
Er schreibt: “…Meines ehemaligen Schülers Ismar David erinnere ich mich noch sehr deutlich als einen sehr sympathischen und begabten Menschen. Es wird mich immer freuen, Nachricht von ihm zu erhalten.“3Letter from Wolfgang Tiessen to Ismar David, August 16, 1962. Ismar David papers, box 1, folder 5, Cary Graphic Arts Collection, RIT.
Today a letter from Prof. Orlowski, who is just now vacationing on Lake Lugano until the beginning of October, arrived. (Address: Carnago at Lugano, Switzerland, Pension Deserto).
He writes: “I still remember my former student Ismar David very distinctly as a very congenial and gifted person. I would be delighted to hear from him any time.”
David travelled in Europe in the summer of 1963. In an undated draft, written on stationery from the Seehotel zur Ueberfahrt/Egern, an impressive hotel on the shore of the Tegernsee, David recalls the devotion that Orlowski demonstrated towards his students:
Vor vielen Jahren war ich einer Ihrer Schüler (1928-1931) Während ich nicht annehme einen tiefen Eindruck bei Ihnen hinterlassen zu haben, habe ich durch all die Jahre nicht ver meiner Studienzeit, in der Sie der Mittelpunk waren nicht vergessen. Ich entsinne mich noch deutlich Ihrer Hingabe zu den Problemen des Lehrens und der Schüler. Auch hatte ich vor einiger Zeit Gelegenheit etwas von Ihren späteren Arbeiten zu sehen, und Das Buch of Psalter Buch mit Ihren Holzschnitten hat mich sehr beeindruc hat mich sehr beeindruckt und gabe einer R und wurde bei einigen meiner Kollegen denen ich es zeigte sehr bewundert. Sollten Sie für mich etwas Zeit finden würde ich Sie gerne während meines kurzen Aufenthaltes in Berlin besuc sp sehen. Ich werde f vom zwischen dem 15. und 18. dieses Monates in Berlin sein und Sie anrufen.
Mit besten Grüssen Ihr. I
Dear Professor Orlowski
Many years ago, I was one of your students (1928-1931) While I don’t imagine I made a deep impression on you, I have not forgotten, through the years, the period of my studies. I can still remember clearly your dedication to the problems of teaching and of the students. Also, I had the opportunity some time ago to see your later work. The Book of Psalms with your woodcuts impressed me very much and some of my colleagues, to whom I showed it, admired it very much. If you could find some time for me, I would very much like to see you during my short stay in Berlin. I’ll be in Berlin between the 15th and 18th of this month and will call you.
Johannes Boehland, 1903–1964, graphic designer, calligraphy teacher at Städtische Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule Berlin-Charlottenburg.
Johannes Boehland and a student From Johannes Boehland, Eine Monographie by Fritz Hellweg, Heintze & Blanckertz, Berlin-Leipzig, 1938
Edward Johnston begat Anna Simons who begat Rudolf Weiß, who begat Johannes Boehland. Boehland, as a dedicated teacher at Hochschule für bildende Künste Berlin, Meisterschule für Graphik und Buchgewerbe Berlin and the städtischen Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule Berlin-Charlottenburg begat countless calligraphers, among them Ismar David.
Johannes Boehland was the son of two painters Richard Boehland and Flora Gaillard. His education exposed him to many forms of fine and commercial art and he was adept at drawing and painting as well as calligraphy and graphics. However, Boehland felt a calling for teaching early on and it is as a teacher that he arguably made his greatest contribution. In the 1956, Ismar David wrote to him:
Many thanks for your friendly letter. I am very sorry not to have answered you sooner, particularly because the resumption of our relationship gave me such a good feeling. Unfortunately, I am one of those who easily forget a language and only learn new one with difficulty. So now I can’t express myself in any language as I would like. That’s the cause of my belated writing and I hope that you will have forbearance with me.
The following is an expression of what I care deeply about. During my student years, it was you who brought the subject of writing close to me. Your influence let me see the harmony and rhythm in writing, woke in me an understanding of the culture, tradition and development of writing. You showed me how to apply expressive possibilities and the richness of form to writing. Your own enthusiasm and example were infectious and thrilling.
In my later life, I remember my student years with pleasure and have tried to further develop what I began under the guidance of my teacher. I would like to try to formulate my view (as far as it concerns the area of writing) which came to me gradually, and surely coincides with yours, as follows:
We should study and absorb the development of writing forms and try to understand the cultural epochs that these styles reflect. We should then re-make these writing forms that we use with our creative will and these forms should mirror our own feelings and our time. [We should let them] feel the pulse of our era.
Even if we don’t reach the perfection of form of the best classical forms, we nevertheless have to keep writing alive and to fill the forms, as applied, with new life. Writing should not only be a technical necessity for communication, but also a living form of art, which is newly shaped in each generation. The photographic and printed reproductions that I send to you are all from work created in the last four years, with the exception of the Hebrew Type, that took more than ten years to develop, the final contours of which were delivered in 1950/51. I hardly have any material from the time I lived in Israel. I devoted a large portion of my time to interior architectural problems and exhibition projects. I only rarely had the opportunity to carry out graphic work. I hope that some of the material can be useful and of interest for the journal.
I would be very happy to hear from you again. We plan a trip to Europe in the summer (end of July to the beginning of August) and if these plans become a reality, we would probably also come to Germany and then I would…
Invitation by Johannes Boehland, 1963
Gertrud von Kalkstein Galerie, Berlin Spandau, Bismarckstrasse 61 Invitiation to the opening of the exhibition Johannes Boehland. Drawings from a recent study trip to Italy; and from book graphics and lettering on Monday November 11, 1963 at 6:30. Open Monday-Friday 12-6:30 pm, Sunday 10 am-4 pm Duration of the exhibition November 11-30, 1963
Ernst Mechner, 1895–1956, Head of Berlin office of the Keren Kayemet Leisrael, film-maker, map planner, graphic designer, writer.
Ernst Mechner, Tel Aviv 1938.Photo by Rudi Weissenstein
In 1932, Ernst Mechner headed the Berlin office of the Jewish National Fund. As part of the leadership involved in production of the Golden Book, he was instrumental in bringing Ismar David to Jerusalem.
Berlin, December 8, 1931
Concerning: Ismar David.
I’m informing you about a thorough conversation, that I had with the young artist. He is only 21 years old and a rare type among West European Jews. He is by profession a craftsman, namely, a trained house painter and has only recently turned to decorative arts. Now he is mostly busy with the restoration of antique objects. His serious view of the importance of a solid craftsmanship as a basis for every artistic endeavor is especially impressive. It’s a concept that is still very rare among us Jews.
In a letter to you, Mr. David has offered to execute the design himself. He would only require that his travel and accommodation for 14 days be paid for. The front cover can be used in the present form, hence the rest will require only two weeks.
Mr. D. would, however, also be willing, to do the work here, which would have many advantages, because the procurement of the, in some places, very rare materials, is easier here and the hand tools are available. Over there, we would run into difficulties acquiring the materials.
I don’t know what you’ve decided about the execution of the design. But I think if £35 has already been paid, then we shouldn’t let the design remain unfinished. And surely, the artist himself , when he’s also a craftsman, can make the thing better than another [person], especially since it will probably be a hopeless effort to find someone there who has mastered this unusual technique.
Mr. David is not a Zionist. He has a positive Jewish attitude, but is completely immersed in his art. He could, if given the commission to execute the work, whether in Berlin or in Jerusalem (in which case naturally much more closely), form a long term association with us. If you arrange for him to come over there with the tourists who come for the Maccabia Games, the matter will be extraordinarily cheap, and I would recommend it to you.
With Zion’s Greeting,
Dr. Ernst Mechner
Keren Kajemeth Leisrael
