Anna & Bernhard Blume

1936–2020; 1937–2011

Both Anna Blume (German, 1936–2020) and Bernhard Blume (German, 1937–2011) studied at the Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf from 1960 until 1965. Bernhard Blume also completed a degree in philosophy at the University of Cologne. Their artistic cooperation began toward the end of the 1970s. Since 1980 they have devoted their efforts as “protagonists of the self” to their large-format staged picture sequences, which they refer to as a “lifelong photographic” novel. Bernhard Blume took part in the 1977 documenta 6 in Kassel with his Solipsistische Sequenz. In 1989 the Museum of Modern Art in New York presented a solo exhibition of their jointly staged series Küchenkoller and Mahlzeit. Anna Blume taught as a guest lecturer at various art colleges into the 1990s. Bernhard Blume was a professor until 2002 at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg.