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Theo Balden

Theo Balden (February 6th 1904-September 30th 1995) was a German graphic designer and sculptor.

Theo Balden- born Otto Koehler in in Blumenau, Brazil- was the child of Bertha and Otto Koehler. He was their third child and was born in the year 1904. His father abruptly passed away due to a tragic accident in 1905, and his mother moved the family to Berlin, Germany in the following year. He began school in 1910 and (because of his stand-out artistic talent) began private drawing lessons in 1917. He studied at the Bauhaus in Weimar from 1923-24 under prominent figures such as László Moholy-Nagy and Oskar Schlemmer. In 1924, he transitioned into working as an independent artist and became involved with the Rote Hilfe (Red Aid), a group associated with the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), in 1926. He formally joined the KPD in 1928 and became a member of the Association of Revolutionary Visual Artists (Asso) in 1929. With the rise of the Nazi regime, he participated in underground resistance efforts and was apprehended in January 1934, but he was released under police surveillance after nine months. In 1935, he finally assumed the alias we know him as today: Theo Balden. He fled to Prague using a the new name on a forged passport and was a key figure in establishing the Oskar Kokoschka League of German and Austrian Artists. The occupation of Czechoslovakia by German forces in 1939 compelled him to seek refuge in Great Britain. As he resided in London, he balanced his artistic endeavors with employment as a gardener and wed Annemarie Romahn (Annemarie Balden-Wolff). Following the German invasion of France, he, along with other German expatriates, was detained as an enemy alien but secured release in 1941 through the intervention of the British Royal Academy of Arts. Upon returning to London, he worked in metal casting and contributed to the Derby City Museum. In 1947, he resettled in Germany, specifically East Berlin, two years after the cessation of World War II. He contributed to the satire magazine Ulenspiegel from 1948 to 1950 and served as an instructor at the Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weißensee in the GDR from 1950 to 1958. He retired prematurely due to health concerns and a heart attack at the age of 54. his departure is often interpreted as a dismissal from academia due to his critical stance during the Formalism Debate, which contested socialist realism as the obligatory artistic style. Following his divorce from Annemarie Romahn in 1952, he remarried Edith Egerland in 1955 and fathered a son. In 1970, he attained membership in the German Academy of Arts and was honored as a member of the Association of Visual Artists of the GDR in 1974. He was interred near his final residence at the Pankow III Cemetery.