Otto Gutfreund

Otto Gutfreund (August 1889 – 2 June 1927), also written Oto Gutfreund, was a Czech-Czechoslovak sculptor. After studying art in Prague and Paris, he became known in the 1910s for his sculptures in a cubist style. After his service in the First World War he worked in a more realistic style. His later work includes many small polychrome ceramic figures as well as architectural decorations.

Otto Gutfreund was born in the town of Dvůr Králové nad Labem, Bohemia, into a Jewish family as the fourth of five children of Karel and Emilie Gutfreund. During 1903 to 1906 he studied pottery at the Škola výtvarných umění (School of Creative Arts) in the town of Bechyně. From 1906 to 1909 he studied in the figurative and ornamental modelling department department of the Umělecko-průmyslová škola (College of Decorative Arts) in Prague.

Gutfreund discovered the works of the French sculptor Antoine Bourdelle during his 1909 exhibition in Prague organized by the artistic group SVU Mánes. Gutfreund then moved to Paris where he studied under Bourdelle at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière from 1909 to 1910.

In Paris he met Auguste Rodin and discovered medieval art. In 1910 he left Paris and travelled to Great Britain, Belgium, and Germany before returning to Prague.

In 1912 Gutfreund became a member of Skupina výtvarných umělců (Group of Creative Artists) in Prague and exhibited there his first cubo-expressionist sculpture Úzkost (Anxiety). The next year he participated in the second exhibition of the Group and showed his works Hamlet, Harmony and Concert. Between 1913 and 1914 he used the principles of analytical cubism in his work. In the third exhibition Gutfreund displayed the cubo-expressionist works Viki and Head with a Hat. He exhibited at Der Sturm gallery in Berlin and at the fourth Group exhibition in Prague. In 1914 he travelled to Paris where he met Pablo Picasso, Juan Gris, Guillaume Apollinaire and Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler.

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