Herbert Rösler (15 June 1924 – 11 November 2006) was a German artist, writer and designer.
He worked as a painter,
graphic designer
A graphic designer is a practitioner who follows the discipline of graphic design, either within companies or organizations or independently. They are professionals in design and visual communication, with their primary focus on transforming ...
, sculptor, developed models for futuristic architecture, designed clothes, furniture and handcrafted jewelry.
Furthermore, he is also known as founder of the Christian work- and housing-community ''Gruppe 91'' (''Group 91''), their beliefs and lifestyle have similarities to the
Jesus movement.
Rösler was the creative and spiritual guidance for this community from their beginning in 1968 to the date of his passing in 2006.
Artworks of Rösler are on permanent display in the exhibition hall ''G91-Bau'' in
Tübingen
Tübingen (; ) is a traditional college town, university city in central Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated south of the state capital, Stuttgart, and developed on both sides of the Neckar and Ammer (Neckar), Ammer rivers. about one in ...
.
Besides their cultural engagement, Rösler and his group were also committed to many social projects.
Life and work
Youth, War and first employments (1924–1967)

Herbert Rösler was born as the youngest of three children.
His father came from
Neutrebbin and was a certified forester and estate manager, his mother was from
Franconia
Franconia ( ; ; ) is a geographical region of Germany, characterised by its culture and East Franconian dialect (). Franconia is made up of the three (governmental districts) of Lower Franconia, Lower, Middle Franconia, Middle and Upper Franco ...
.
Around 1938 he began training as a technical merchant for his first employment.
By the age of 18 he voluntarily joined the military and was stationed with a
tank
A tank is an armoured fighting vehicle intended as a primary offensive weapon in front-line ground combat. Tank designs are a balance of heavy firepower, strong armour, and battlefield mobility provided by tracks and a powerful engine; ...
battalion in Africa.
As a
prisoner of war
A prisoner of war (POW) is a person held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610.
Belligerents hold prisoners of war for a ...
he was brought to the United States where he had to work on the field and in the woods, in his free time he began with drawing.
Along with other detained soldiers he was dismissed in France where he and his group were captured and imprisoned again.
In 1948 he managed to escape and made his way back to Germany.
Rösler was changed by the war and from there on considered himself as a pacifist.
After the war, he worked as a decorator for
Polydor
Polydor Limited, also known as Polydor Records, is a British record label that operates as part of Universal Music Group. It has a close relationship with Universal's Interscope Geffen A&M Records label, which distributes Polydor's releases in ...
, designed movie posters for local cinemas and started his own
advertising agency
An advertising agency, often referred to as a creative agency or an ad agency, is a business dedicated to creating, planning, and handling advertising and sometimes other forms of promotion and marketing for its clients. An ad agency is generall ...
.
In 1948 he met Ischabell Nadler (5 March 1930 – 13 March 2015), they married in 1951 and had two children.
Rösler moved from Stuttgart to
Cologne
Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...
in 1960 where he became head of the
set design department for the record label
Electrola.
As part of this job he was in charge of the stage arrangements for a
Maria Callas Tournee, the
Ansbach Bach Week, the
Bayreuth Festival
The Bayreuth Festival () is a music festival held annually in Bayreuth, Germany, at which performances of stage works by the 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner are presented. Wagner himself conceived and promoted the idea of a special ...
and the German
Schlager-Festival in
Baden-Baden
Baden-Baden () is a spa town in the states of Germany, state of Baden-Württemberg, south-western Germany, at the north-western border of the Black Forest mountain range on the small river Oos (river), Oos, ten kilometres (six miles) east of the ...
.
During his time in Cologne, Rösler met
Wolf Vostell who was also working for the Electrola as a
cover art
Cover art is a type of artwork presented as an illustration or photograph on the outside of a published product, such as a book (often on a dust jacket), magazine, newspaper ( tabloid), comic book, video game ( box art), music album ( album ar ...
designer.
After a few years in the Electrola around 1964, Rösler and an associate bought an old candy-factory which they renovated as a studio for advertisement photography.
In 1966 Rösler suffered a stroke and the studio was sold again.
After his recovery he worked as a freelancing
graphic designer
A graphic designer is a practitioner who follows the discipline of graphic design, either within companies or organizations or independently. They are professionals in design and visual communication, with their primary focus on transforming ...
,
caricaturist
A caricaturist is an artist who specializes in drawing caricatures.
List of caricaturists
* Abed Abdi (born 1942)
* Abril Lamarque (1904–1999)
* Al Hirschfeld (1903–2003)
* Alex Gard (1900–1948)
* Alexander Saroukhan (1898–1977)
* Alfre ...
,
exhibition architect and was responsible for the
pagination
Pagination, also known as paging, is the process of dividing a document into discrete page (paper), pages, either electronic pages or printed pages.
In reference to books produced without a computer, pagination can mean the consecutive page num ...
of the German
Physicians Journal.
Beginning of the Gruppe 91 (1968–1972)
Besides his work, Rösler further pursued his passion to draw and engaged in
meditation
Meditation is a practice in which an individual uses a technique to train attention and awareness and detach from reflexive, "discursive thinking", achieving a mentally clear and emotionally calm and stable state, while not judging the meditat ...
.
In the night of 18/19 September 1968, Rösler experienced a
vision
Vision, Visions, or The Vision may refer to:
Perception Optical perception
* Visual perception, the sense of sight
* Visual system, the physical mechanism of eyesight
* Computer vision, a field dealing with how computers can be made to gain und ...
that marks an important spiritual turning point in his life.
He quit his job and opened his house for young people from all over Germany.
This is how the ''Gruppe 91'' was founded, it is named after city-district number to that time of
Ostheim (part of
Kalk, Cologne) where the community lived.
In February 1972 the group was featured in the nationwide broadcast documentary ''Pop und Weihrauch'' (''Pop and Frankincense'') of the Swiss director
Roman Brodmann.
The documentary focused on the German ''
Jesus People'' and other Christian revival groups.
Time at Lake Constance (1973–1983)
In 1973 the group moved to
Southern Germany, first to the
Black Forest
The Black Forest ( ) is a large forested mountain range in the States of Germany, state of Baden-Württemberg in southwest Germany, bounded by the Rhine Valley to the west and south and close to the borders with France and Switzerland. It is th ...
and from there on to
Lake Constance
Lake Constance (, ) refers to three bodies of water on the Rhine at the northern foot of the Alps: Upper Lake Constance (''Obersee''), Lower Lake Constance (''Untersee''), and a connecting stretch of the Rhine, called the Seerhein (). These ...
.
During their residence in the Black Forrest region, Rösler began with his first large-scale paintings.
These paintings were initially exhibited in the farm estate near Lake Constance which the Gruppe 91 inhabited.
On an area of about 5000 m
2 at the
Friedrichshafen Fair 1981 his work became accessible to a wider audience in the exhibition called ''... für eine neue Welt ...'' (''... for a new world ...'').
Many exhibitions in the local area around Lake Constance followed like on the ''Internationale Bodenseemesse'' (''International Lake Constance Fair'').
In the years from 1977 to 1983 Rösler created hundreds of paintings, plastics, sculptures and design drafts.
Rösler was the empowering and inspiring guide for the members of his group, he often provided the drafts and they implemented it.
File:Roesler-Exhibition Bodensee 1976.jpg, Gallery at Lake Constance, 1976
File:Roesler-Exhibition Bodensee 1977.jpg, Gallery in the farm estate at Lake Constance, 1977
File:Roesler-Sculpture Hand 1994.jpg, Handsculpture from various metals, 1994
File:Gruppe 91 2003.jpg, Gruppe 91, 2003
Era Tübingen (1983–2006)
On the way back from
Munich
Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...
on 18 June 1983, Herbert Rösler was involved in a serious car accident where he lost 90% of his eyesight.
He was hospitalized and treated over several months in a specialized eye clinic in Tübingen.
During his recovery he dictated the book ''Für eine neue Welt'' (''For a new world'').
The book features prose, poetry, drawings and photographs of the group, it was
self-published in 1985.
Before the end of 1983 the Gruppe 91 also moved to Tübingen.
The majority of Rösler's work was created between 1984 and 2006.
From 1991 to 2000 his work was displayed in a gallery near the
Steinlach.
Since then it is exhibited in the G91-Bau which was an old construction hall for tanks, transformed and redesigned after Rösler's drafts.
In 2002 a local newspaper featured an article about Herbert Rösler and the Gruppe 91 entitled "''Jetzt können wir sagen Chadasch''" ("''Now we can say Chadasch''").
This gave birth to the self chosen titling for Rösler's style of art ''Chadasch'' which is the Hebrew word for ''new''.
Since his passing in 2006, members of the Gruppe 91 still live by Rösler's spirit and carry on his artistic legacy in the G91-Bau and further local exhibitions.
[ Article in the local newspaper Schwäbisches Tagblatt.]
File:G91-Bau (um 1996).jpg, G91-Bau, Tübingen
File:Tablett mit Gläsern entworfen von Herbert Rösler (ca.1969).jpg, Serving tray
File:H Rösler - Modell Frühling. Top und Rock (um 1995).jpg, Fashion
File:Regal entworfen von Herbert Rösler (1998).jpg, Shelf
External links
Video: The Gruppe 91 at home (in German)
Homepage of the Gruppe 91(in German)
Herbert Rösler's biography in Tübingen's
city wiki TÜpedia. (in German)
Notes
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rösler, Herbert
2006 deaths
20th-century German painters
Postmodern artists
German modern sculptors
German pacifists
1924 births
Artists from Stuttgart
20th-century German sculptors
20th-century German male artists
German installation artists
German Army personnel of World War II
German prisoners of war in World War II held by the United States
German prisoners of war in World War II held by France
German escapees
Escapees from French detention