Peter Behrens
architect, designer, painter, graphic artist
* 1868 in Hamburg - † 1940 in Berlin
Peter Behrens learned painting in Karlsruhe, Düsseldorf and Munich. He became a co-founder of the Munich Secession in 1892 and of the "Vereinigte Werkstätten für Kunst im Handwerk" in 1897. From 1899 to 1903 he worked as a member of the artists' colony in Darmstadt, where his earliest work as an architect, his own house, was built. From 1903 to 1907 Behrens headed the Düsseldorf Kunstgewerbeschule (school of arts and crafts). In 1907 he was among the co-founders of the Deutscher Werkbund. In the same year, he was appointed to Berlin as artistic adviser of the AEG company. There he had a decisive influence on the development of modern industrial design.
