Benita Koch-Otte (23 May 189226 April 1976), born Benita Otte, was a German weaver and textile designer who trained at the

Bauhaus The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., 200 ...

Life and work

Benita Otte was born on 23 May 1892 in

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. Otte's father was a chemist. After attending Lyceum in

Krefeld Krefeld ( , ; li, Krieëvel ), also spelled Crefeld until 1925 (though the spelling was still being used in British papers throughout the Second World War), is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located northwest of Düsseldorf, i ...

, Otte taught drawing and physical education in

Uerdingen Uerdingen () is a district of the city of Krefeld, Germany, with a population of 17,888 (2019). Originally a separate city in its own right, Uerdingen merged with the city of Krefeld in 1929. Today, Uerdingen is best known for a local distillery ...

. In 1920, she enrolled at the Bauhaus in

Weimar Weimar is a city in the state of Thuringia, Germany. It is located in Central Germany between Erfurt in the west and Jena in the east, approximately southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together with the neighbouri ...

where she studied in the studio's weaving workshop. She was later employed in the workshop, working closely with

Gunta Stölzl Gunta Stölzl (5 March 1897 – 22 April 1983) was a German textile artist who played a fundamental role in the development of the Bauhaus school's weaving workshop, where she created enormous change as it transitioned from individual pictorial ...

. Otte left the Bauhaus in 1925.Bauhaus100. Bentia Koch-Otte
Retrieved 15 May 2019 Haus_am_Horn,_interior,_küche_01

Although she worked primarily as a weaver, Otte, on a number of occasions, produced work beyond the medium. Notable among this work is Otte's design for the kitchen of the 1923

Haus am Horn The Haus am Horn is a domestic house in Weimar, Germany, designed by Georg Muche. It was built for the Bauhaus ''Werkschau'' (English: ''Work show'') exhibition which ran from July to September 1923. It was the first building based on Bauhaus des ...

in Weimar, which inspired

Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky Margarete "Grete" Lihotzky (born 23 January 1897 in the Margareten district of Vienna, Austria-Hungary – 18 January 2000) was an Austrian architect and a communist activist in the Austrian resistance to Nazism. She is mostly remembered tod ...

's 1926

Frankfurt kitchen The Frankfurt kitchen was a milestone in domestic architecture, considered the forerunner of modern fitted kitchens, for it was the first kitchen in history built after a unified concept, i.e. low-cost design that would enable efficient work. It ...

. After leaving the Bauhaus, Otte served as head of the weaving workshop at the

Kunstgewerbeschule A Kunstgewerbeschule (English: ''School of Arts and Crafts'' or S''chool of Applied Arts'') was a type of vocational arts school that existed in German-speaking countries from the mid-19th century. The term Werkkunstschule was also used for thes ...

Burg Giebichenstein, a vocational arts college in Halle, now the

Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design (BURG) is the university of art and design in Halle an der Saale that was established in 1915. With a student body numbering over 1,000, BURG is one of the largest universities of art and design in Germany. It offers 20 art and design degree progr ...

.Dolgner, Angela (ed.) (1993) ''Burg Giebichenstein. Die hallesche Kunstschule von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart; Staatliche Galerie Moritzburg, Halle, 20. März bis 13. Juni 1993 ; Badisches Landesmuseum, Karlsruhe, 25. Juni bis 12. September 1993.'' Halle: Staatliche Galerie Moritzburg In 1929 she reunited with the

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus' Places *Czech, ...

photographer (1896–1934) who studied with Otte at the Bauhaus; Benita married Koch later that year. A number of former students and teachers from the Bauhaus went to work at the school, including:

Gerhard Marcks Gerhard Marcks (18 February 1889 – 13 November 1981) was a German artist, known primarily as a sculptor, but who is also known for his drawings, woodcuts, lithographs and ceramics. Early life Marcks was born in Berlin, where, at the age of 18, ...

, the

Rector Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to: Style or title *Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations *Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...

from 1928 until 1933;

Hans Wittwer Hans Wittwer (4 February 1894 – 19 March 1952) was a Swiss architect who worked in Germany and who taught architecture at the Bauhaus art school in Dessau. He was a proponent of functionalist architecture; the idea that form follows function. H ...

, who ran the Architecture department; Marguerite Friedländer and

Erich Consemüller Erich Consemüller (10 October 1902 — 11 April 1957) was a German photographer and architect who studied and taught at Bauhaus art school. He worked alongside the photographer Lucia Moholy documenting life at the Bauhaus. Early life Consemüller ...

. Following the

Nazi rise to power Adolf Hitler's rise to power began in the newly established Weimar Republic in September 1919 when Hitler joined the '' Deutsche Arbeiterpartei'' (DAP; German Workers' Party). He rose to a place of prominence in the early years of the party. Be ...

in 1933, Koch-Otte and other staff considered avant-garde were dismissed from the school. Koch-Otte and her husband then moved to

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

. Heinrich Koch died in an accident in 1934, and Benita returned to Germany, where she taught at the

Bodelschwingh Foundation Bethel The Bethel Foundation, officially the Bodelschwingh Foundation Bethel (german: von Bodelschwinghsche Stiftungen Bethel as of 2009, previously ''v. Bodelschwinghsche Anstalten Bethel'') is a diaconal (i.e. Protestant charitable) psychiatric hos ...

(German:''Bodelschwinghsche Stiftungen Bethel''), a

psychiatric hospital Psychiatric hospitals, also known as mental health hospitals, behavioral health hospitals, are hospitals or wards specializing in the treatment of severe mental disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, dissociative ...

in the Bethel district of

Bielefeld Bielefeld () is a city in the Ostwestfalen-Lippe Region in the north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population of 341,755, it is also the most populous city in the administrative region (''Regierungsbezirk'') of Detmold and the ...

. At the hospital, Koch-Otte ran weaving workshop for patients. She worked at the foundation until her 1957 retirement.

Death and legacy

Koch-Otte died on 26 April 1976 in Bielefeld, Germany. Former students of Benita Koch-Otte include

Trude Guermonprez Trude Guermonprez, born Gertrud Emilie Jalowetz (1910 1976), was a German-born American textile artist, designer and educator, known for her tapestry landscapes. Her Bauhaus-influenced disciplined abstraction for hand woven textiles greatly contr ...

, among others. Benita Koch-Otte Street (''Benita-Otte-Straße'') in

Erfurt Erfurt () is the capital and largest city in the Central German state of Thuringia. It is located in the wide valley of the Gera river (progression: ), in the southern part of the Thuringian Basin, north of the Thuringian Forest. It sits i ...

is named after her.

References

External links

Bauhaus100. Benita Koch-Otte
{{DEFAULTSORT:Koch-Otte, Benita Bauhaus alumni German textile artists Women textile artists Artists from Stuttgart 20th-century German artists 20th-century German women artists 1892 births 1976 deaths

Life and work

Death and legacy

See also

References

External links