Biography
Josef Weisz (b. Munich, Germany 1894 – d. Planegg, Germany 1969) began an apprenticeship with a goldsmith in 1909 but later studied the art of bookmaking at the Munich School of Applied Arts (1913-16) as a student of Fritz Helmuth Ehmcke (1878-1965). He created expressionist woodcuts and lithographs for book illustrations, for example for Goethe’s Faust but by 1937, his work was being confiscated by the Nazis as it was regarded as ‘Degenerate Art’. After the Second World War he used wildlife and the depiction of plants as a recurring motif and was awarded a most beautiful book prize in 1952 for Heiteres Tirbuch.
