Born: 1897 Leipzig, Germany
Died: 1972 London, England
Year of Migration to the UK: 1951
Other name/s: Margarete Kroch, Grete Kroch Frishman, Greta Kroch Frishman
Biography
Printmaker and sculptor Margret Kroch-Frishman was born into a well-to-do Jewish family in Leipzig, Germany on 3 January 1897. She studied printmaking at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, Leipzig under prominent typographer Walter Tiemann before moving (against her family’s wishes) to Berlin, where she continued her studies under printmaker Hans Meid and painter Karl Hofer at the Berlin Academy of Fine Arts. There she met Austrian Expressionist Oskar Kokoschka, who helped her secure studio space. Since she received no financial support from her family, she also worked as a trapeze artist at the Busch Circus to cover her living expenses. In 1923 she married Marcel Frishman, a cartoonist and contributor (from 1926) to the satirical weekly magazine Simplicissimus and began contributing her own illustrations to periodicals includingDie Dame, Berliner Illustrierte and Die Jugend. Following Hitler's accession to the Chancellorship in 1933 and the introduction of increasingly anti-Semitic legislation, Kroch-Frishman and her husband moved first to Copenhagen, Denmark and then to Belgium, where they remained between 1934 and 1939, including a period at an arts centre for refugees at Berchem-Sainte-Agathe, outside Brussels; they also helped a number of their relatives to escape from Nazi Germany. In 1939 they were forced to return to Berlin when their visas expired but managed to escape, boarding one of the last vessels departing from Toulon, France for Melbourne, Australia. There they joined Kroch-Frishman's elder sister and her husband Berthold Monash, cousin of former commander-in-chief Sir John Monash.
Despite such lofty connections, in Melbourne Kroch-Frishman took on a variety of menial jobs, including working as a cleaner, after her husband enlisted in the army in 1942. Nevertheless, postwar she exhibited regularly, including at Kozminsky's Gallery (1945), Velasquez Galleries (1948, with her husband) and the Victorian Artists' Society (1948). An art critic for Melbourne newspaper The Argus described her work as benefitting from her 'Continental background and training', elaborating, 'She is at her best ... in her sensitive and well designed drawings and well-realised sculptures. Her watercolours also are fresh and vigorous'. During her time in Australia Kroch-Frishman also met prominent sculptor and fellow former Berliner, Erwin Fabian (1915–2020), with whom she and her husband remained lifelong friends.
In 1951 the Frishmans left Australia, immigrating to England and settling at the Abbey Arts Centre for artist refugees in New Barnet. Established in 1946 by art dealer William Ohly, the Abbey attracted many expatriate Australian artists during the years 1947–51 and became a base for those trying to gain a foothold in London's contemporary art world. After her husband's death in 1952, Kroch-Frishman moved to Gerald Road, Belgravia, with her son Martin, where regular notable guests included historian Eric Hobsbawm, composer, Thea Musgrave, painters Peter de Francia and Katerina Wilczynski, as well as writers Jakov Lind and John Berger and designer Yolanda Sonnabend, among others. Kroch-Frishman continued to produce lithographs and etchings and exhibited in London at the Ben Uri Gallery (1951 and 1952), at Wildenstein & Co (1961), and at Manchester's Tib Lane Gallery (1967). She also made regular trips to Israel, France and Italy, befriending and exhibiting alongside a number of late Italian Futurists (Galleria d'Arte Giraldo, Treviso, 1966). After seeing an exhibition of her work in Venice, de Francia said: 'The nuances of the colours, which often give the impression of the finesse of a watercolour, the skilful dosage of tones and the clarity of the impression have the chromatic equivalents, in the musical sense, of an extremely personal balanced and totally honest visual language. This maturity is the result of incessant work. Margret is part of that line of female painters that goes from Berthe Morisot to Käthe Kollwitz, with whom she makes her own contribution to twentieth-century painting' (correspondence with Federica Frishman, September 2020).
In 1965, prominent British print publisher, Editions Alecto, produced a portfolio of nine etchings and aquatints by Kroch-Frishman and in July 1968 a piece from her portfolio, Tulips (1965), was purchased for the Government Art Collection. The following year she moved to a studio house in Steeles Road, Belsize Park. Margret Kroch-Frishman died in London, England on 12 June 1972. Her work is represented in the UK public domain in the Government Art Collection. In 2022 a Paul Mellon Centre for British Art research seminar on the Abbey Arts Centre featured the Frishmans.
Related books
- Correspondence with Federica Frishman, September-October 2020
- Jeremy Lewison, Review of Editions Alecto: Original Graphics, Multiple Originals 1960–1981 by Tessa Sidey, Print Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 2, 2004, pp. 212-215
- Margret Kroch Frishman. Paintings, Drawings & Etchings (Manchester: Tib Lane Gallery, 1967)
- Margret Kroch Frishman (Venice: Galleria Santo Stefano, 1965)
- Margret Kroch Frishman. Exhibition of Paintings: Oils and Etchings (London: Flower House Galleries, 1965)
- Margret Kroch-Frishman (Paris: Galerie André Weil, 1963)
- Other Shows, The Herald, 27 September 1948, p. 2
- Magaraet [sic] Kroch-Frishman, The Argus, Melbourne, 21 August 1945, p. 4
- Exhibition of Jewish Art, The Argus, Melbourne, 17 June 1948, p. 6
Public collections
Related organisations
- Abbey Arts Centre (member)
- Berlin Academy of Fine Arts (student)
- Berliner Illustrierte (contributor)
- Die Dame (contributor)
- Die Jugend (contributor)
- Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, Leipzig (student)
Related web links
- Ben Uri archives
- 'Exhibition of Jewish Art', The Argus, Melbourne, 1948
- Paul Mellon Centre, research seminar, Marginalised Spaces, Emigre Artists, 2022
- University of Melbourne, lecture on the Abbey Arts Centre, 2021
Selected exhibitions
- Margret Kroch-Firshman, Brod Gallery, St. James's, London (1969)
- Margret Kroch Frishman, Galleria Santo Stefano, Venice (1969)
- Margret Kroch-Frishman. Paintings, Drawings & Etchings, Tib Lane Gallery, Manchester (1967)
- Margret Kroch-Frishman. Exhibition of Paintings: Oils and Etchings, Flower House Galleries, London (1965)
- Margret Kroch-Frishman, Galerie André Weil, Paris (1963)
- Some Contemporary British Painters XVII, Wildenstein & Co, London (1961)
- Margret Kroch Frishman, Gallery One, London (1961)
- Australian Artists' Association, Imperial Institute Art Gallery, London (1957)
- Summer Exhibition by Contemporary Jewish Artists, Ben Uri Art Gallery (1952)
- Autumn Exhibition of Paintings, Sculptures and Drawings by Contemporary Jewish Artists, Ben Uri Art Gallery, London (1951)
- Margaret Kroch-Frishman, Kozminsky's Gallery, Melbourne (1945)
- Staatliche Gallerie, Berlin (1929)
