He was one of the most creative commercial graphic artists of his period, and was decades ahead of it stylistically. After leaving the Bauhaus in Dessau in 1928, Herbert Bayer continued in Berlin to rigorously pursue the principles of modern graphic art developed at the Bauhaus. Up to the time of his emigration to the USA in 1938, he created hundreds of posters, title pages for books and journals, and commercial adverts and brochures. His clients included companies from the consumer goods industry and publishers, as well as state and semi-state institutions. Bayer also put his innovative advertising ideas at the service of the Nazi dictators.

Seventy-five years after he emigrated, this exhibition offered a critical and comprehensive view of Herbert Bayer’s work from 1928 to 1938. The exhibition has been organized in collaboration with guest curator Prof. Patrick Rössler of the Universität Erfurt and is part of the Berlin Theme Year 2013 ‘Diversity Destroyed – Berlin during National Socialism’.