A. R. Penck was born Ralf Winkler in Dresden in 1939. From 1953 he attended courses in drawing and painting given by Jürgen Böttcher (Strawalde). In the 1960s, in addition to paintings, he produced books, sculptures and his first films. In 1969 he first adopted the pseudonym A. R. Penck. In 1972 he was invited to documenta 5 in Kassel, and in 1975 awarded the Will Grohmann Prize of the Academy of Arts, West Berlin. He left the GDR in 1980 and settled in the Federal Republic, in Cologne. From 1988 to 2003 he taught as a professor at the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf, upon retiring he moved to Dublin (Ireland). In 2007 a major retrospective of his oeuvre was exhibited at the Schirn Kunsthalle in Frankfurt. Penck died in Zurich in 2017.
Wolfgang Petrick was born in 1939 in East Berlin. From 1958 to 1965 he studied at the University of the Fine Arts in West Berlin. In 1964 he was a co-founder of the artists’ cooperative gallery Grossgörschen 35 in West Berlin. In 1971 he spent a period in Paris with the scholarship of the Cité Internationale des Arts. In 1976 he took part in documenta 6 in Kassel. From 1975 to 2007 he taught as a professor at the University of Arts in Berlin. In 1993 he was elected to the Academy of Arts, Berlin. Petrick lived and worked in Berlin and, since 1994, in New York. He died 2025 in Berlin.
Wolfgang Peuker was born in 1945 in Aussig (today Ústí nad Labem, Czech Republic), but moved with his family to Halle/Saale (Saxony-Anhalt). From 1963 to 1965 he attended evening classes at the Academy of Fine Arts in Leipzig. From 1965 to 1970 by he completed a study course there under Harry Blume, Bernhard Heisig, Wolfgang Mattheuer and Werner Tübke. Peuker was awarded the Art Prize of the City of Leipzig and the Art Prize of the GDR. In 1984 he took part in the Venice Biennale. In 1993 he became professor at the Weissensee University of the Arts, Berlin. Peuker died in Berlin in 2001.
Stefan Plenkers was born in 1945 in Ebern near Bamberg (Bavaria) and grew up in Görlitz (Saxony). From 1967 to 1972 he completed a study of graphic art at the Academy of Art in Dresden where he became a master student under Gerhard Kettner until 1982. Between 1986 and 1994 he embarked on many study travels taking in Berlin, Iraq, China, Lapland and the USA. In 2011 he was honoured with a retrospective of his work at the Städtische Galerie in Dresden. Stefan Plenkers last lived and worked in Dresden, where he died in 2024.
Arno Mohr was born in 1910 in Posen (today Poznań, Poland), but grew up in Berlin from 1911 onwards. In 1933–34 he studied at the United State Schools of Free and Applied Art in Berlin-Charlottenburg. After the Second World War, from 1946 to 1975 he was a professor at the Weissensee University of the Arts in East Berlin, of which he was a co-founder. Mohr received numerous honours, for example in 1961 the Käthe Kollwitz Prize of the Academy of Arts of the GDR and in 1980 the National Prize of the GDR. Mohr died in Berlin in 2001.
Helmut Middendorf was born in 1953 in Dinklage (Lower Saxony). From 1973 to 1979 he studied painting at the University of Arts, West Berlin, and was a master student under K. H. Hödicke. In 1977 he co-founded the Galerie am Moritzplatz in West Berlin and numbered among the Neue Wilde. In 1979 Middendorf taught experimental film at the University of Arts, West Berlin, then spent a period in New York with a DAAD scholarship. Middendorf lives and works in Berlin and Athens.
Silke Miche was born in 1970 in Nordhausen (Thuringia). After a study course at the Free University of Berlin, she studied painting at the Weissensee University of the Arts in Berlin from 1997 to 2004, where she became a master’s student. In 2000 she was awarded an Erasmus Scholarship at the Accademia di belle arti di Venezia and in 2010 a scholarship from the Käthe-Dorsch-Stiftung. Miche lives and works in Berlin and Brandenburg.
Werner Liebmann was born in Königsthal (Thuringia) in 1951. After studying chemistry and working as an engineer, between 1976 and 1982 he completed his study of painting under Hannes Wagner at the Burg Giebichenstein University of Arts in Halle (Saale), following which he was a master student of Bernhard Heisig at the Academy of Fine Arts in Leipzig. From 1986 he taught at the Academy of Art in Dresden. From 1993 to 2017 he was professor of painting at the Weissensee University of the Arts, Berlin. Liebmann lives and works in Berlin.
Rolf Lindemann was born in 1933 in Magdeburg (Saxony-Anhalt). After an apprenticeship as a decorative painter, from 1951 to 1956 he studied painting at the Weissensee University of the Arts in East Berlin. From 1980 to 1989 he worked as a visiting teacher at the School of Advertising and Design in Berlin-Schöneweide (East Berlin). In 2000 he was awarded the Helen Abbott Prize for Fine Art. The taught at the Volkshochschule in Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg from 1991. Lindemann died in 2017.
Elke Lixfeld was born in 1942 in Königsberg in East Prussia (today Kaliningrad, Russia). In the 1960s she lived in West Berlin. A master student in 19 at the University of Arts, West Berlin in 1979 she was a co-founder of the artists’ group and gallery “1/61”. In 1983 she held a year-long scholarship of the State of Berlin at MoMA PS1 in New York. She taught as a visiting teacher in 1988 at the University of Arts, West Berlin, and in 1998 at the Zanabazar Museum of Fine Arts, Ulan Bator (Mongolia). Lixfeld lives and works in Berlin.