From biomorphic forms to cubic elements
In the post-war years, Hans Steinbrenner (1928-2008) worked as a poster painter and graphic designer for the US army. From 1946 to 1949, he studied at the former Werkkunstschule Offenbach am Main. From 1949 to 1952, he attended the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main, where he joined the master class of Hans Mettel (1903-1966), before he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich in the class of Toni Stadler (1888-1982) from 1952 to 1954.

While Hans Steinbrenner's early work still shóws the influence of his teachers in Frankfurt and Munich, his encounters with the sculptors Constantin Brâncusi (1876-1957) and Henri Laurens (1885-1954) would have a lasting impact on him. The influence of Hans Arp (1886-1966) can also be observed in his cubic-abstract sculptures, as well as in his characteristic, oversized biomorphic figures, mainly made of wood, such as our huge work entitled "Große Vegetative".

From the late 1960s, Steinbrenner finally attained a visual language that, as our two works demonstrate, draws on cubic elements and incorporates human proportions. Henceforth, the artist called his sculptures "figures" without further distinguishing them by names. And this is also how the sculptor proceeded with this stele, which he first hewed from a wooden trunk and then cast in bronze.

With graphic precision, he reduced the human body to strictly geometric, stacked forms, the individual elements of which are not arranged symmetrically, but slightly offset from one another. The rhythmic vertical lines lend the sculpture a lively silhouette and the dynamic surfaces also provide a fascinating contrast to the rigid materiality, as in the approximately 200 centimeter high stone "Stele" from 1985. [MvL]