Johannes Hofmeister 1914-1990
Johannes Gjurup Hofmeister was born in Hjørring, northern Denmark on 1st December 1914. He was a Danish painter.
Hofmeister grew up in a very religious household and initially trained as a bricklayer, but after attending a lecture by the Danish painter and printmaker Karl Aksel Jørgensen (1883-1957) at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 1939 he decided to become a painter. Hofmeister was completely self-taught.
Hofmeister had a lifelong love for the landscape of the Vendsyssel district, and the subject matter of his paintings reflect where he lived at any one time. He lived on Halsagervej, central Hjørring (1939-1950), in the countyside outside Hjørring (1950-1966) and finally (1966-1990) in a Dutch windmill and millhouse in Lønstrup on the Vendsyssels west coast - which he bought and converted (in 1962).
Hofmeister exhibited at the Holstebro Art Societys inaugral exhibition (Holstebro Kunstforening) in December 1952 alongside (husband and wife painters) Agnete Bjerre (b.1924) and Frede Christoffersen (1919-1987) and the Dnish landscape painter Svend Engelund (1908-2007). In 1959 he was part of the group exhibition 10 Painters (10 Malere) at Hjørring Gymnasium in 1959 and exhibited frequently (from 1950) at the annual Vrå Exhibition (Vrå-udstillingen), which was first establised by his friend Svend Engelund in 1942.
Hofmeister is represented at Vendsyssel Art Museum (Vendsyssel Kunstmuseum), the National Gallery of Art (Statens Museum for Kunst), Museum of Modern Art, Aalborg, the Skovgaard Museum and the Kunstbygningen (Art Building) in Vrå.
There memorial exhibition for Hofmeister at the Frederikshavn Art Museum (Frederikshavns Kunstmuseum) in 1991 and The Vendsyssel Art Museum honoured Hofmeister with a larger retospective exhibition (entitled An artists life in, with and around the landscape) in 2007.
Johannes Hofmeister died in Hjørring on 26th August 1990, aged 75.
Johannes Hofmeister was the brother of the sculptor Poul Hofmeister (1923-1998).