Forgotten and Rediscovered
G.B.R. van Hoboken (1893–1971)

G.B.R. van Hoboken was born into a well-off family in Wiesbaden in 1893. He suffered from diphtheria as a child, and this led later in life to a complete loss of hearing. In 1912 he began his artistic training in Munich, where he made friends with the artist Otto Kopp, the cinematographer Walter Ruttmann and the composer Max Butting. His major Expressionist prints were produced there between 1916 and 1920, notably portraits, landscape impressions and nudes. In 1920 Hoboken moved to Berlin and set up the Hoboken Press, a lithographic print shop for artists, at Fasanenstrasse 13 in Charlottenburg. His customers included Ludwig Meidner, Rudolf Schlichter, John Heartfield, Max Oppenheimer and Ewald Mataré. Hoboken also worked together with the publishers Fritz Gurlitt and Gustav Kiepenheuer. His own works were discovered in the workshop after his death and first shown in 1972 at the gallery G.A. Richter. In 2019 the Berlinische Galerie acquired a number of prints by this forgotten Expressionist.