Ronald Paris

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Ronald Paris
Paris in 2012
Born	(1933-08-12)12 August 1933 Sondershausen, Thuringia, Germany
Died	17 September 2021(2021-09-17) (aged 88)
Occupation(s)	Painter Graphic artist
Spouse(s)	Helga Steffens Isolde Hanke
Children	3

Ronald Paris (12 August 1933 – 17 September 2021

He left school in 1948, the year of his parents' divorce, and started an apprenticeship in nearby Weimar focused on glass art and stained glass.^[5] By this time his urge to become a painter had become firmly rooted: between 1950 and 1952 he undertook appropriate studies, starting with evening classes at the Visual Arts Academy in Weimar and moving on, in 1951, to the Workers' and Peasants' faculty at Jena where he qualified for an entitlement to attend a university. He then undertook a brief internship/traineeship at the Castle Museum in Gotha.^[5] Between 1953 and 1958 he studied Mural painting at the Visual Arts Academy at Weissensee (Berlin).^[5] Here his teachers included Kurt Robbel [de], Arno Mohr, Bert Heller, Gabriele Mucchi and Toni Mau.

Artistic and career development

In 1959 he embarked on a career as a freelance artist. In the same year he undertook a 3,000 km (1,800 mile) study tour to the

In 1961 his triptych, "Village Games in Wartenberg" ("Dorffestspiele in Wartenberg") was savagely criticised by the leadership of East Germany's ruling Socialist Unity Party, who insisted that his presentation of workers did not correspond with official idealised presentations. In 1962 Ronald Paris drew up the prestigious poster for the Brecht drama Schweik in the Second World War. Between 1963 and 1966 he was a "master-scholar" under Otto Nagel at the Berlin Arts Academy. In 1965 Ronald Paris was a co-founder of the "Intergrafik Treinnale", later becoming the event's president.

In 1969 Paris painted the popular singer-actor Ernst Busch for a series entitled "Artists as seen by artists" ("Künstler sehen Künstler"). Two versions of the Busch portrait were produced, and the second of them was exhibited in the seventh National Art Exhibition in Dresden. The circumstances proved controversial because the "portrait" by Paris showed not Busch in a characteristically heroic pose, but as a tired old man. Ronald Paris received much criticism over the matter, not least from Ernst Busch who was furious. In the end the painting was purchased by the Ministry for Culture and was subject to a high-profile "disappearance". It is now considered "lost". ^[4]

Between 1993 and 1999 Ronald Paris was a professor at the "Burg Giebichenstein" Arts Acadademy in Halle. Since 1985 he has lived and worked in Rangsdorf near Berlin.^[3]

Family and friends

Between 1961 and 1974, Ronald Paris was married to the photographer Helga Paris; they had two children, Robert (1962) and Jenny Helena (1964). From 1985 he was married to Isolde Paris. Their daughter, Anna Therese, was born in 1976.

The landscape artist from Schwerin, Wilhelm Facklam, was his maternal uncle.^[6]

Close friends included the painters Ursula Wendorff-Weidt and Gabriele Mucchi, along with the singer Wolf Biermann, the graphic artist Herbert Sandberg and Ursula's husband, the expressionist dance pioneer Jean Weidt.

References