August Klett, or Klotz (1866–1928), was a German

outsider art Outsider art is art made by self-taught or supposedly naïve artists with typically little or no contact with the conventions of the art worlds. In many cases, their work is discovered only after their deaths. Often, outsider art illustrates e ...

ist with

schizophrenia Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis. Major symptoms include hallucinations (typically hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. Other symptoms include social withdra ...

and one of the "schizophrenic masters" profiled by

Hans Prinzhorn Hans Prinzhorn (6 June 1886 – 14 June 1933) was a German psychiatrist and art historian. Born in Hemer, Westphalia, he studied art history and philosophy at the University of Vienna, receiving his doctorate in 1908. He then went to England to ...

in his field-defining work ''

Artistry of the Mentally Ill ''Artistry of the Mentally Ill: a contribution to the psychology and psychopathology of configuration'' (german: Bildnerei der Geisteskranken: ein Beitrag zur Psychologie und Psychopathologie der Gestaltung) is a 1922 book by psychiatrist Hans Pr ...

''. The pseudonym August Klotz (''Klotz'' being a disparaging term for a person of low intelligence) was given by Prinzhorn.Krannert Art Museum 1984, p. 11 He was born in

Heilbronn Heilbronn () is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in northern Baden-Württemberg, Germany, surrounded by Heilbronn (district), Heilbronn District. With over 126,000 residents, it is the sixth-largest city in the state. From the late Mid ...

. His father was a prosperous

Swabia Swabia ; german: Schwaben , colloquially ''Schwabenland'' or ''Ländle''; archaic English also Suabia or Svebia is a cultural, historic and linguistic region in southwestern Germany. The name is ultimately derived from the medieval Duchy of ...

n merchant, and Klotz worked in his father's business as a wine and champagne salesman for many years. Aside from a case of

gonorrhea Gonorrhea, colloquially known as the clap, is a sexually transmitted infection (STI) caused by the bacterium '' Neisseria gonorrhoeae''. Infection may involve the genitals, mouth, or rectum. Infected men may experience pain or burning with ...

, he was healthy until an attack of

influenza Influenza, commonly known as "the flu", is an infectious disease caused by influenza viruses. Symptoms range from mild to severe and often include fever, runny nose, sore throat, muscle pain, headache, coughing, and fatigue. These symptoms ...

in 1903. After his illness he fell into a deep depression in which he heard

hallucinatory A hallucination is a perception in the absence of an external stimulus that has the qualities of a real perception. Hallucinations are vivid, substantial, and are perceived to be located in external objective space. Hallucination is a combinatio ...

voices insulting him. He attempted suicide by slashing his abdomen with a knife.Cardinal 1972, p. 88 Klotz was placed in an asylum in

Göppingen Göppingen ( Swabian: ''Geppenge'' or ''Gebbenga'') is a town in southern Germany, part of the Stuttgart Region of Baden-Württemberg. It is the capital of the district Göppingen. Göppingen is home to the toy company Märklin, and it is the b ...

where his case notes describe him as engaged in art-making by August 1903. He rubbed figures into his wallpaper with fat and called them "

Freemason Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...

signs". He created charts in which letters correspond to numbers, the sums of which correspond to colors. This may be evidence that he experienced an unusual form of grapheme-color synaesthesia. Klotz loved playing word games, and this same playfulness is apparent in his drawings and watercolors. He often invented lengthy compound nouns, such as ''Halmdolchfischgradtropfeneweiss'' ("Stalk-dagger-fish-bone-drop-egg-white"), and his pictures sometimes feature shapes that have double meanings.Cardinal 1972, p. 89 An example is Klotz's drawing ''Wurmlöcher'' (''Wormholes''), which Roger Cardinal describes as depicting "a head in profile with wavy hair that incorporates fingertips, worms, and caterpillar heads. Another part of the head juxtaposes nuns and flamingoes". Unlike most outsider artists, Klotz displayed little consistency in his work. He sometimes began a drawing by placing a stone on a sheet of paper and tracing a line around it. Prinzhorn saw him as a shining example of the creative impulse at its most basic. "He always allows himself to be driven by momentary impulses so that his pictures generally incorporate the unconscious components of pictorial creation in a rare state of purity ... he composes completely passively, almost as a spectator, and afterward tries to interpret his configurations".Prinzhorn 1972, p. 143

Notes

Resources

* Cardinal, Roger. 1972. ''Outsider Art''. New York, Washington: Praeger. . * Krannert Art Museum. 1984. ''The Prinzhorn Collection: Selected Work from the Prinzhorn Collection of the Art of the Mentally Ill : Krannert Art Museum, University of Illinois, Urbana/Champaign, Champaign, Illinois, November 10, 1984 to January 6, 1985 nd others'. Champaign, Ill: University of Illinois, Urbana/Champaign. . * Prinzhorn, Hans. ''Artistry of the mentally ill: a contribution to the psychology and psychopathology of configuration''. Trans. Eric von Brockdorff. New York, NY: Springer-Verlag, 1972. . * http://www.stiftadmont.at/deutsch/presse/prinzhorn/KUeNSTLERBIOGRAFIEN_Handout.pdf {{DEFAULTSORT:Klett, August 1866 births 1928 deaths German draughtsmen German watercolourists Outsider artists People with schizophrenia German male painters 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists